7 ms·

We should not be surprised. The Kingdom of Saud is rooted in wahhabism - an ultraconservative branch of Islam that also happens to be the primary influence of a

We should not be surprised. The Kingdom of Saud is rooted in wahhabism - an ultraconservative branch of Islam that also happens to be the primary influence of a little group called Daesh/ISIL.

mtgx 11y ago
It's already messed up that one of U.S. "allies" would be behind the 9/11 attacks, and that U.S. went ahead and invaded a whole other country for it anyway, but at least there could be an argument to be made that it wasn't the Saudi government behind it (which seems rather likely that it wasn't). But protecting who the culpable parties were in the biggest attack on the U.S. since Pearl Harbor, because it "might endanger relationships" with that country (and after already invading Iraq for supposedly the same reason), is beyond messed up. Everyone involved in covering it up should be tried as traitors, as I don't just say that as a hyperbole.
- explorer666 11y ago
  > Everyone involved in covering it up should be tried as traitors, as I don't just say that as a hyperbole. Don't expect them to speak out then.
- lintiness 11y ago
  we invaded afghanistan because bin laden was residing there and those in charge, the taliban, were protecting him (or the other way around given real political strength). it's fun to imagine the entire us intelligence apparatus as corrupt and criminal, but reality's plenty interesting.
  - cmg 11y ago
    The Taliban offered to put bin Laden on trial before 9/11 even happened (for earlier acts of terror). The US refused. http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2011/09/20119115334167663.html http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2011/09/20119115334167663... After 9/11, the Taliban also offered to hand bin Laden over to the US. The Bush administration rejected the offer, as it would require 1) proof of a connection and 2) an end to the bombing of Afghanistan. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/14/afghanistan.terrorism5 http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/14/afghanistan.ter... The Taliban and al Qaeda were not close allies. Mullah Omar, founder of the Taliban, actually despised bin Laden's tactic of attacks on the West and anywhere outside the area the Taliban ruled.
    - nickpsecurity 11y ago
      Offered him up during Clinton administration, too, with result being Clinton bombing some people. Got to the point that some people thought bin Laden was an informant. In any case, bin Laden said he had nothing to do with 9/11 then a FBI spokesman in (2006?) said they had no evidence tying him to 9/11. I don't need any wild speculation to think they might be scapegoating him for something. Maybe simply tying up loose ends from CIA's prior work on things like training terrorists to beat superpowers. You bet they didn't interrogate him on purpose and not out of anger. ;)
      - lintiness 11y ago
        here come the crazies! inside jobses, metal beams don't melt!!!!
        nickpsecurity 11y ago
        I was quoting the FBI. You can tell them how crazy you think they are. Meanwhile, the 9/11 Commission Report itself indicated attackers were funded by and tight with Saudi elites. You might, based on official report, wonder why our Presidents and counterterror efforts are tight with the one country they said sponsored 9/11 and other terrorism. ;)
        lintiness 11y ago
        i've read the report, and it's very very clear: osama bin laden and al qaeda were behind every facet of the attack.
        nickpsecurity 11y ago
        The report does claim that. It cites the government agencies whose declassified documents say they armed him in the first place. They lied about that for a long time. They were caught repeatedly lying, esp on torture or surveillance effectiveness, during that administration. Using CIA's own intelligence framework, their source integrity rating would be very, very low even if I trusted 9/11 Commission to faithfully do their part. I mean, think about it, do we really trust CIA and DOD to give us evidence that they're guilty of negligence with direct access to source materials by 9/11 Commission? Or should we reject those parts as tainted? The latter is standard in every criminal investigation in U.S. outside of cases involving "national security." In any case, the other thing the report said was that Arab-Americans working for CIA posed as Saudi's to trick AQ operatives into cooperating. Turned out, they thought they were saved by their Saudi friends and gave all kinds of unlisted numbers to royalty, etc. The revelation that funding and connected personnel came from the Saudi's means we should've torn up Saudi Arabia looking for them if our goal was stopping/punishing terrorists. Instead, Afghanistan and... Iraq...? While giving arms and military training to the Saudis through private military companies? And sharing terrorist intelligence with them when they just funded 9/11? What... the... hell...? Now, fast forward to today, the Obama Administration is still protecting the pages showing level of Saudi involvement. The Saudi's still don't want their info or people in a courtroom. You indicate OBL and Afghanistan are all we gotta worry about whereas the 9/11 report on Saudi involvement, that classified doc, and U.S. government working their ass off to protect Saudi's that funded 9/11 seems to suggest very opposite of your or official claims. That is, if OBL did it at all, he was just a tool for a large, Saudi organization connected to their financial and political elites that murdered 3,000 Americans. That connection is in official report, but downplayed. And U.S. government, for whatever reason, is doing everything they can to cover that up and keep justice from happening. If that's not evidence of supporting terrorism or negligence re 9/11 then I don't know what is. Note: We've been able to show complicity or U.S. support of terrorism without resorting to anything beyond their own official report and actions. No conspiracy sites, no thermite, nothing. Just their own claims and hard work to protect Saudi crooks.
- Slamidan 11y ago
  It's interesting that this is the result of a country practicing a hands off policy, instead of the "cultural imperialism" many complain about. The Saudi's chose to work with the US over the brits because we agreed to firewall our operations to keep their culture/society "pure" as possible.
cordite 11y ago
I've heard the comparison that this group is the same kind of caliphate style setup where they wear white instead and stability is granted through oil and money. However, I don't know how accurate such a statement is. I've also heard SA compared to a bunch of tribes that are continually bribed to behave cohesively.
- SEJeff 11y ago
  It is accurate. Daesh follow wahabism, the Saudi branded form of Islam that is much more extreme as did Osama Bin Laden. The HuffPo isn't my favorite news source, but this is a good article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-yousaf-butt-/saudi-wahhabism-islam-terrorism_b_6501916.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-yousaf-butt-/saudi-wahhabis...
  - hasenj 11y ago
    Moreover, the current Saudi state (dynasty?) was established using the same method that Daesh is using.
    - bigfudge 11y ago
      Which monarchies aren't rooted in violence?
      - hasenj 11y ago
        The difference is they still preach it as the right thing
  - pakled_engineer 11y ago
    Daesh according to the docs found written by Haji Bakr, the ex Iraqi military officer who was the chief architect of that group, have their own sect http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-files-show-structure-of-islamist-terror-group-a-1029274.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-file... It's a mix of Sururiyya, which is influenced by Wahhabism and Ba'athism where a state is ruled by a vanguard party. They removed the disloyal parts of Sururiyya which called for questioning inept leaders and replaced it with the unwavering loyalty obligations of a typical Ba'athist dictatorship. The fact that Saddam era henchmen who clashed with KSA over the pillaging of Kuwait are running Daesh, plus the propaganda coming out from them calling for the removal of the house of Saud as custodian of the two holy mosques, and considering Saudi military defectors and political dissenters make up the majority of Daesh recruits it seems suicidal they would support them in anyway. Maybe there are political opposition in KSA doing so but even that would risk their own status since Daesh proved they don't care about agreements when they invaded Mosul and promptly executed the local elite who helped them get in.
leaveyou 11y ago
Also, we should not be surprised if the rest of the documents will be declassified when, for various reasons, there will be an acute need of war with Saudi Arabia.
- spriggan3 11y ago
  > Also, we should not be surprised if the rest of the documents will be declassified when, for various reasons, there will be an acute need of war with Saudi Arabia. There will never be a war with KSA. This place is way too sensitive even the US wouldn't dare touch it. It would be an instant war with the Muslim world. The US has other ways to pressure KSA if needed. I don't think anybody in the US would be that foolish and attack the Mecca .
  - leaveyou 11y ago
    Maybe I'm naive, but I think there are contingency plans for (almost) everything. Imagine for example there is a coup in KSA and "the bad guys" end up in power and they do crazy things with "our fuel".
  - gotchange 11y ago
    Place Mecca & Medina under international Muslim custodianship* , and then proceed with your war plans. You realize that those two cities constitute only a small geographic area of the Hijaz region let alone the whole Arabia? *: BTW this is an actual demand of Iran and many other predominantly Muslim countries to have the Islamic holy sites under int'l custodianship and not be treated as part of House of Saud's possessions as it seems the case with time passing while these people in power.
    - imglorp 11y ago
      Like the Swiss are custodians for the Vatican, not the Italians.
      - nihonde 11y ago
        No, that's because Switzerland is the Templar state!
dismal2 11y ago
There is a fantastic Adam Curtis documentary about Saudi Arabia and Wahhabism called Bitter Lake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Lake_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Lake_(film) Due to various issues, you'll just have to find a way to watch it... (BBC iplayer blocked in us, copyright issues when posted on youtube, etc, etc, etc)
- kough 11y ago
  I feel like the problem with Adam Curtis' work is... well, Adam Curtis. It's very easy to dismiss his entire body of work as "conspiracy theory", because he only writes about these sorts of topics. And it does him and his work a disservice, because of course there is a lot of truth in what he writes and produces. As with anything, there is also a lot of unsubstantiated narrative, but for anyone who's on the fence I would highly recommend watching Bitter Lake. Even if you think Curtis is a crank, the film is beautiful and the score is fantastic (Burial, Four Tet, etc.) and you might find some of the facts interesting.
  - basch 11y ago
    I really like Adam Curtis from an entertainment perspective (similar to charlie brooker/blackmirror), he feels like real life twilight zone. If people haven't read Adam Curtis's THEN NOW, it's well worth the time - http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/78691781-c9b7-30a0-9a0a-3ff76e8bfe58 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/78691781-c9b7-... "HAPPIDROME - Part One" is great too - http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/5a7b18b5-0ec3-3d3e-a307-54820a7c6a59 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/5a7b18b5-0ec3-... His conspiracy theories remind me more of Alan Moore's definition. "Yes, there is a conspiracy, indeed there are a great number of conspiracies, all tripping each other up ... the main thing that I learned about conspiracy theories is that conspiracy theorists actually believe in the conspiracy because that is more comforting. The truth of the world is that it is chaotic. The truth is, that it is not the Jewish banking conspiracy, or the grey aliens, or the twelve-foot reptiloids from another dimension that are in control, the truth is far more frightening; no-one is in control, the world is rudderless."
  - clay_to_n 11y ago
graedus 11y ago
I knew this was suspected but I thought it was officially denied. Apparently it's acknowledged by the Saudis. This quote from a recent FT article [0] surprised me: After the Iraqi city of Mosul fell to a lightning Isis offensive in 2014, even the late Prince Saud al-Faisal, the respected Saudi foreign minister, remonstrated with John Kerry, US secretary of state, that “Daesh [Isis] is our [Sunni] response to your support for the Da’wa” — the Tehran-aligned Shia Islamist ruling party of Iraq. [0] https://next.ft.com/content/876a971c-0644-11e6-a70d-4e39ac32c284 https://next.ft.com/content/876a971c-0644-11e6-a70d-4e39ac32...
- iheartmemcache 11y ago
  If you invest a lot of time, whether it's configuring your .vimrc/.emacs.d/init.el or throwing a lot of money at a specific car/tool brand, you're naturally going to have an emotional attachment with that. Read the comments on tool reviews on youtube - contractors have holy wars over their DeWalts vs Milkwakees. Slashdot in the mid 90s was emacs vs vim/GNOME2 vs KDE3 for the better part of a decade. It's not limited to only the Perl greybeards or contractors - it's quite common for tenured professors to be ousted as complete frauds after some other lab tries to replicate the findings only to yield entirely different results. "The results should have yielded this, so .." This is human nature - people are going to inherently defend anything they invested a lot of time in learning/using/doing. With religion, it's 10x more intense because they can't put down the beaker or drill and go have a beer with their buddies - it's their entire identity. FT/Der Spiegel/The Guardian(usually)/the Newshours(BBC/PBS) all do a good job for the limited amount of time/column-lines they have to cover such a complicated topic such as religious factionism that goes back thousands of years. Then there's the Bismarckian Realpolitik which is certainly a large aspect of it. There was certainly Saudi money behind it. But when you hear "state-sponsored terrorism" it could mean a lot of things. A governor or 8th son might have funded a non-profit NGO which later turned out to be mostly legitimate but 10% of those funds were diverted to purchase New-old-stock over-stock arms from the former USSR (then the question arises - was it with or without his knowledge?). because the House of Saud itself has politics that are so intricate internally that you'd have to spend years studying that exclusively. Start reading about the First Saudi state of 1744 (under Abdel Wahhab's rule in alliance with ibn Saud) and a few thousand pages later one might have half of a grasp on the internal politics. And that's just historical internal Saudi politics. Bring in religious subsets and hatred spawned from that, ethnic hatred (Persians are about as Arab, as Japanese are Chinese), international interests propping up different regimes and it's all a very complicated game. Think of how complicated our government operates with just two parties - the capitalists who retain the lobbyists that influence the congressmen who have multiple interests that have to be simultaneously balanced in order to keep their constituents, donors, and party all happy enough so that you retain power. It's all a subtle game of spinning plates and we're working with just with two parties (effectively).
samstave 11y ago
So you know how the Bush family is in bed with the Saudis (bandar bush for example) - after watching bitter lake i am more convinced the Saudis did it, but the neocon Hawks and bush family was complicit.
Jugurtha 11y ago
I've always found the way security/terrorism issues are portrayed in movies or the news, especially in the U.S. to be really "cute". The manicheism of it all made me believe that either every news anchor really has no clue about how it works, or that they're exceptionally good actors. I also found that many times, events tend to be seen as discrete things that live in a vacuum rather than rooted to some previous event (isn't it interesting that these documents are resurfacing during a transition period where the U.S. is turning its back to Saudi Arabia and warming it up with Iran? Small pieces of content and info injected here and there). An interesting piece if you have a few minutes to spare: https://20committee.com/2014/09/25/what-if-everything-you-know-about-terrorism-is-wrong/ https://20committee.com/2014/09/25/what-if-everything-you-kn...

We should not be surprised. The Kingdom of Saud is rooted in wahhabism - an ultraconservative branch of Islam that also happens to be the primary influence of a little group called Daesh/ISIL.

mtgx 11y ago

It's already messed up that one of U.S. "allies" would be behind the 9/11 attacks, and that U.S. went ahead and invaded a whole other country for it anyway, but at least there could be an argument to be made that it wasn't the Saudi government behind it (which seems rather likely that it wasn't). But protecting who the culpable parties were in the biggest attack on the U.S. since Pearl Harbor, because it "might endanger relationships" with that country (and after already invading Iraq for supposedly the same reason), is beyond messed up. Everyone involved in covering it up should be tried as traitors, as I don't just say that as a hyperbole.

explorer666 11y ago
> Everyone involved in covering it up should be tried as traitors, as I don't just say that as a hyperbole. Don't expect them to speak out then.
lintiness 11y ago
we invaded afghanistan because bin laden was residing there and those in charge, the taliban, were protecting him (or the other way around given real political strength). it's fun to imagine the entire us intelligence apparatus as corrupt and criminal, but reality's plenty interesting.
- cmg 11y ago
  The Taliban offered to put bin Laden on trial before 9/11 even happened (for earlier acts of terror). The US refused. http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2011/09/20119115334167663.html http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2011/09/20119115334167663... After 9/11, the Taliban also offered to hand bin Laden over to the US. The Bush administration rejected the offer, as it would require 1) proof of a connection and 2) an end to the bombing of Afghanistan. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/14/afghanistan.terrorism5 http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/14/afghanistan.ter... The Taliban and al Qaeda were not close allies. Mullah Omar, founder of the Taliban, actually despised bin Laden's tactic of attacks on the West and anywhere outside the area the Taliban ruled.
  - nickpsecurity 11y ago
    Offered him up during Clinton administration, too, with result being Clinton bombing some people. Got to the point that some people thought bin Laden was an informant. In any case, bin Laden said he had nothing to do with 9/11 then a FBI spokesman in (2006?) said they had no evidence tying him to 9/11. I don't need any wild speculation to think they might be scapegoating him for something. Maybe simply tying up loose ends from CIA's prior work on things like training terrorists to beat superpowers. You bet they didn't interrogate him on purpose and not out of anger. ;)
    - lintiness 11y ago
      here come the crazies! inside jobses, metal beams don't melt!!!!
      - nickpsecurity 11y ago
        I was quoting the FBI. You can tell them how crazy you think they are. Meanwhile, the 9/11 Commission Report itself indicated attackers were funded by and tight with Saudi elites. You might, based on official report, wonder why our Presidents and counterterror efforts are tight with the one country they said sponsored 9/11 and other terrorism. ;)
        lintiness 11y ago
        i've read the report, and it's very very clear: osama bin laden and al qaeda were behind every facet of the attack.
        nickpsecurity 11y ago
        The report does claim that. It cites the government agencies whose declassified documents say they armed him in the first place. They lied about that for a long time. They were caught repeatedly lying, esp on torture or surveillance effectiveness, during that administration. Using CIA's own intelligence framework, their source integrity rating would be very, very low even if I trusted 9/11 Commission to faithfully do their part. I mean, think about it, do we really trust CIA and DOD to give us evidence that they're guilty of negligence with direct access to source materials by 9/11 Commission? Or should we reject those parts as tainted? The latter is standard in every criminal investigation in U.S. outside of cases involving "national security." In any case, the other thing the report said was that Arab-Americans working for CIA posed as Saudi's to trick AQ operatives into cooperating. Turned out, they thought they were saved by their Saudi friends and gave all kinds of unlisted numbers to royalty, etc. The revelation that funding and connected personnel came from the Saudi's means we should've torn up Saudi Arabia looking for them if our goal was stopping/punishing terrorists. Instead, Afghanistan and... Iraq...? While giving arms and military training to the Saudis through private military companies? And sharing terrorist intelligence with them when they just funded 9/11? What... the... hell...? Now, fast forward to today, the Obama Administration is still protecting the pages showing level of Saudi involvement. The Saudi's still don't want their info or people in a courtroom. You indicate OBL and Afghanistan are all we gotta worry about whereas the 9/11 report on Saudi involvement, that classified doc, and U.S. government working their ass off to protect Saudi's that funded 9/11 seems to suggest very opposite of your or official claims. That is, if OBL did it at all, he was just a tool for a large, Saudi organization connected to their financial and political elites that murdered 3,000 Americans. That connection is in official report, but downplayed. And U.S. government, for whatever reason, is doing everything they can to cover that up and keep justice from happening. If that's not evidence of supporting terrorism or negligence re 9/11 then I don't know what is. Note: We've been able to show complicity or U.S. support of terrorism without resorting to anything beyond their own official report and actions. No conspiracy sites, no thermite, nothing. Just their own claims and hard work to protect Saudi crooks.
Slamidan 11y ago
It's interesting that this is the result of a country practicing a hands off policy, instead of the "cultural imperialism" many complain about. The Saudi's chose to work with the US over the brits because we agreed to firewall our operations to keep their culture/society "pure" as possible.

cordite 11y ago

I've heard the comparison that this group is the same kind of caliphate style setup where they wear white instead and stability is granted through oil and money. However, I don't know how accurate such a statement is. I've also heard SA compared to a bunch of tribes that are continually bribed to behave cohesively.

SEJeff 11y ago
It is accurate. Daesh follow wahabism, the Saudi branded form of Islam that is much more extreme as did Osama Bin Laden. The HuffPo isn't my favorite news source, but this is a good article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-yousaf-butt-/saudi-wahhabism-islam-terrorism_b_6501916.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-yousaf-butt-/saudi-wahhabis...
- hasenj 11y ago
  Moreover, the current Saudi state (dynasty?) was established using the same method that Daesh is using.
  - bigfudge 11y ago
    Which monarchies aren't rooted in violence?
    - hasenj 11y ago
      The difference is they still preach it as the right thing
- pakled_engineer 11y ago
  Daesh according to the docs found written by Haji Bakr, the ex Iraqi military officer who was the chief architect of that group, have their own sect http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-files-show-structure-of-islamist-terror-group-a-1029274.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-file... It's a mix of Sururiyya, which is influenced by Wahhabism and Ba'athism where a state is ruled by a vanguard party. They removed the disloyal parts of Sururiyya which called for questioning inept leaders and replaced it with the unwavering loyalty obligations of a typical Ba'athist dictatorship. The fact that Saddam era henchmen who clashed with KSA over the pillaging of Kuwait are running Daesh, plus the propaganda coming out from them calling for the removal of the house of Saud as custodian of the two holy mosques, and considering Saudi military defectors and political dissenters make up the majority of Daesh recruits it seems suicidal they would support them in anyway. Maybe there are political opposition in KSA doing so but even that would risk their own status since Daesh proved they don't care about agreements when they invaded Mosul and promptly executed the local elite who helped them get in.

leaveyou 11y ago

Also, we should not be surprised if the rest of the documents will be declassified when, for various reasons, there will be an acute need of war with Saudi Arabia.

spriggan3 11y ago
> Also, we should not be surprised if the rest of the documents will be declassified when, for various reasons, there will be an acute need of war with Saudi Arabia. There will never be a war with KSA. This place is way too sensitive even the US wouldn't dare touch it. It would be an instant war with the Muslim world. The US has other ways to pressure KSA if needed. I don't think anybody in the US would be that foolish and attack the Mecca .
- leaveyou 11y ago
  Maybe I'm naive, but I think there are contingency plans for (almost) everything. Imagine for example there is a coup in KSA and "the bad guys" end up in power and they do crazy things with "our fuel".
- gotchange 11y ago
  Place Mecca & Medina under international Muslim custodianship* , and then proceed with your war plans. You realize that those two cities constitute only a small geographic area of the Hijaz region let alone the whole Arabia? *: BTW this is an actual demand of Iran and many other predominantly Muslim countries to have the Islamic holy sites under int'l custodianship and not be treated as part of House of Saud's possessions as it seems the case with time passing while these people in power.
  - imglorp 11y ago
    Like the Swiss are custodians for the Vatican, not the Italians.
    - nihonde 11y ago
      No, that's because Switzerland is the Templar state!

dismal2 11y ago

There is a fantastic Adam Curtis documentary about Saudi Arabia and Wahhabism called Bitter Lake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Lake_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Lake_(film) Due to various issues, you'll just have to find a way to watch it... (BBC iplayer blocked in us, copyright issues when posted on youtube, etc, etc, etc)

kough 11y ago
I feel like the problem with Adam Curtis' work is... well, Adam Curtis. It's very easy to dismiss his entire body of work as "conspiracy theory", because he only writes about these sorts of topics. And it does him and his work a disservice, because of course there is a lot of truth in what he writes and produces. As with anything, there is also a lot of unsubstantiated narrative, but for anyone who's on the fence I would highly recommend watching Bitter Lake. Even if you think Curtis is a crank, the film is beautiful and the score is fantastic (Burial, Four Tet, etc.) and you might find some of the facts interesting.
- basch 11y ago
  I really like Adam Curtis from an entertainment perspective (similar to charlie brooker/blackmirror), he feels like real life twilight zone. If people haven't read Adam Curtis's THEN NOW, it's well worth the time - http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/78691781-c9b7-30a0-9a0a-3ff76e8bfe58 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/78691781-c9b7-... "HAPPIDROME - Part One" is great too - http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/5a7b18b5-0ec3-3d3e-a307-54820a7c6a59 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/5a7b18b5-0ec3-... His conspiracy theories remind me more of Alan Moore's definition. "Yes, there is a conspiracy, indeed there are a great number of conspiracies, all tripping each other up ... the main thing that I learned about conspiracy theories is that conspiracy theorists actually believe in the conspiracy because that is more comforting. The truth of the world is that it is chaotic. The truth is, that it is not the Jewish banking conspiracy, or the grey aliens, or the twelve-foot reptiloids from another dimension that are in control, the truth is far more frightening; no-one is in control, the world is rudderless."
- clay_to_n 11y ago

graedus 11y ago

I knew this was suspected but I thought it was officially denied. Apparently it's acknowledged by the Saudis. This quote from a recent FT article [0] surprised me: After the Iraqi city of Mosul fell to a lightning Isis offensive in 2014, even the late Prince Saud al-Faisal, the respected Saudi foreign minister, remonstrated with John Kerry, US secretary of state, that “Daesh [Isis] is our [Sunni] response to your support for the Da’wa” — the Tehran-aligned Shia Islamist ruling party of Iraq. [0] https://next.ft.com/content/876a971c-0644-11e6-a70d-4e39ac32c284 https://next.ft.com/content/876a971c-0644-11e6-a70d-4e39ac32...

iheartmemcache 11y ago
If you invest a lot of time, whether it's configuring your .vimrc/.emacs.d/init.el or throwing a lot of money at a specific car/tool brand, you're naturally going to have an emotional attachment with that. Read the comments on tool reviews on youtube - contractors have holy wars over their DeWalts vs Milkwakees. Slashdot in the mid 90s was emacs vs vim/GNOME2 vs KDE3 for the better part of a decade. It's not limited to only the Perl greybeards or contractors - it's quite common for tenured professors to be ousted as complete frauds after some other lab tries to replicate the findings only to yield entirely different results. "The results should have yielded this, so .." This is human nature - people are going to inherently defend anything they invested a lot of time in learning/using/doing. With religion, it's 10x more intense because they can't put down the beaker or drill and go have a beer with their buddies - it's their entire identity. FT/Der Spiegel/The Guardian(usually)/the Newshours(BBC/PBS) all do a good job for the limited amount of time/column-lines they have to cover such a complicated topic such as religious factionism that goes back thousands of years. Then there's the Bismarckian Realpolitik which is certainly a large aspect of it. There was certainly Saudi money behind it. But when you hear "state-sponsored terrorism" it could mean a lot of things. A governor or 8th son might have funded a non-profit NGO which later turned out to be mostly legitimate but 10% of those funds were diverted to purchase New-old-stock over-stock arms from the former USSR (then the question arises - was it with or without his knowledge?). because the House of Saud itself has politics that are so intricate internally that you'd have to spend years studying that exclusively. Start reading about the First Saudi state of 1744 (under Abdel Wahhab's rule in alliance with ibn Saud) and a few thousand pages later one might have half of a grasp on the internal politics. And that's just historical internal Saudi politics. Bring in religious subsets and hatred spawned from that, ethnic hatred (Persians are about as Arab, as Japanese are Chinese), international interests propping up different regimes and it's all a very complicated game. Think of how complicated our government operates with just two parties - the capitalists who retain the lobbyists that influence the congressmen who have multiple interests that have to be simultaneously balanced in order to keep their constituents, donors, and party all happy enough so that you retain power. It's all a subtle game of spinning plates and we're working with just with two parties (effectively).

samstave 11y ago

So you know how the Bush family is in bed with the Saudis (bandar bush for example) - after watching bitter lake i am more convinced the Saudis did it, but the neocon Hawks and bush family was complicit.

Jugurtha 11y ago

I've always found the way security/terrorism issues are portrayed in movies or the news, especially in the U.S. to be really "cute". The manicheism of it all made me believe that either every news anchor really has no clue about how it works, or that they're exceptionally good actors. I also found that many times, events tend to be seen as discrete things that live in a vacuum rather than rooted to some previous event (isn't it interesting that these documents are resurfacing during a transition period where the U.S. is turning its back to Saudi Arabia and warming it up with Iran? Small pieces of content and info injected here and there). An interesting piece if you have a few minutes to spare: https://20committee.com/2014/09/25/what-if-everything-you-know-about-terrorism-is-wrong/ https://20committee.com/2014/09/25/what-if-everything-you-kn...