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This is all false. The reason the US suddenly wanted to kill Assad is very simple. Qutar has natural gas. Europe relies almost solely on Russia for natgas. T

by X86BSD 10y ago

This is all false. The reason the US suddenly wanted to kill Assad is very simple. Qutar has natural gas. Europe relies almost solely on Russia for natgas. The west doesn't like that at all. So they want to build a pipeline from Qutar to the med through Syria. Assad says absolutely not. Assad is now enemy number one for denying the pipeline which would've freed Europe from Russia's natgas stranglehold. This is all about energy folks. It's that simple.

nickik 10y ago
That is totally false. Oil is a major factor but some people throw sense out of the window and want to reduce everything to energy politics. No expert on foreign policy, or the middle east I have heard give talks in the last years, considers this to be true. The only people who believe this narrative are naive leftist who don't understand the real situation.
ars 10y ago
> So they want to build a pipeline from Qutar to the med through Syria. They want to what??? You really need to look at a map before saying things like that. I just..... Do you realize Qatar is on the coast? Why would you need to build a pipeline to another coast? And why go through Syria of all places? There are so many other routes you can take, and you think they want Syria so badly they triggered a war?
- jwtadvice 10y ago
  He's correct. The proposed pipeline goes from Qatar, though Saudi Arabia, through Syria, into Turkey and then would provide Natural Gas to Europe. There's a second proposed pipeline people often don't talk about... it would go from Iran, through Iraq, through Syria to Europe. Guess which one Europe and the United States want.
  - ars 10y ago
    You can just route it a bit to the East and bypass Syria completely, going directly from Iraq to Turkey. If you are willing to go underwater you can go through Jordan, Israel and Cypress. I get that it's a bit shorter to go through Syria, but a war, just for that? There's a major station in Doğubeyazıt, you can link to that.
    - jwtadvice 10y ago
      This is a silly comment for the fact that there are no such pipelines being evaluated or proposed. The argument rests on the idea that there are good ways to bypass Syria (there aren't). And no, the war is not merely about this pipeline. But it is one of the 'prizes' at stake which has gotten the support of foreign countries spending money and shipping arms into Syria proxy forces (notably, in this case, Qatar). Take a look at the Center for Strategic and International Studies policy assessment for Gulf Countries during the Syrian Proxy Conflict: https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/161019_Gulf_States_Policies_on_Syria.pdf https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/1...
- PerfectDlite 10y ago
  > They want to what??? You really need to look at a map before saying things like that. That's the popular 'opinion' induced by Russian propaganda and they're notorious for ignoring the reality.
  - jwtadvice 10y ago
    It's curious how many opinions induced by US propaganda (also notorious for ignoring reality) get greedily shared and magnified in the United States and by United States posters. Please look at the pipelines and read about the actions and incentives of the Gulf State. In particular, Qatar supported al Qaeda in Syria (Nusra as well as the Islamic State Group in addition to a number of other terrorist factions) with the pipeline project as a key aspect of its strategic calculus, even sabotaging, in a way, relations with Iran that had been started to improve.
jwtadvice 10y ago
This is just one of the reasons Syria is a National Security interest for other countries. Another is that Ba'athism in Iraq and Syria has aligned itself against Saudi Arabia. Another is that the possibility of autonomous Kurdish regions in Syria threaten to support domestic terrorist organizations in neighboring countries (Kojave). Another is that Syria provides Russia with a Mediterranean base. The gas pipelines are a huge reason, for sure. But it's not the only reason. Many different actors have many different reasons why supporting their side of the proxy war makes financial and strategic sense.

by X86BSD 10y ago

nickik 10y ago

That is totally false. Oil is a major factor but some people throw sense out of the window and want to reduce everything to energy politics. No expert on foreign policy, or the middle east I have heard give talks in the last years, considers this to be true. The only people who believe this narrative are naive leftist who don't understand the real situation.

ars 10y ago

> So they want to build a pipeline from Qutar to the med through Syria. They want to what??? You really need to look at a map before saying things like that. I just..... Do you realize Qatar is on the coast? Why would you need to build a pipeline to another coast? And why go through Syria of all places? There are so many other routes you can take, and you think they want Syria so badly they triggered a war?

jwtadvice 10y ago
He's correct. The proposed pipeline goes from Qatar, though Saudi Arabia, through Syria, into Turkey and then would provide Natural Gas to Europe. There's a second proposed pipeline people often don't talk about... it would go from Iran, through Iraq, through Syria to Europe. Guess which one Europe and the United States want.
- ars 10y ago
  You can just route it a bit to the East and bypass Syria completely, going directly from Iraq to Turkey. If you are willing to go underwater you can go through Jordan, Israel and Cypress. I get that it's a bit shorter to go through Syria, but a war, just for that? There's a major station in Doğubeyazıt, you can link to that.
  - jwtadvice 10y ago
    This is a silly comment for the fact that there are no such pipelines being evaluated or proposed. The argument rests on the idea that there are good ways to bypass Syria (there aren't). And no, the war is not merely about this pipeline. But it is one of the 'prizes' at stake which has gotten the support of foreign countries spending money and shipping arms into Syria proxy forces (notably, in this case, Qatar). Take a look at the Center for Strategic and International Studies policy assessment for Gulf Countries during the Syrian Proxy Conflict: https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/161019_Gulf_States_Policies_on_Syria.pdf https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/1...
PerfectDlite 10y ago
> They want to what??? You really need to look at a map before saying things like that. That's the popular 'opinion' induced by Russian propaganda and they're notorious for ignoring the reality.
- jwtadvice 10y ago
  It's curious how many opinions induced by US propaganda (also notorious for ignoring reality) get greedily shared and magnified in the United States and by United States posters. Please look at the pipelines and read about the actions and incentives of the Gulf State. In particular, Qatar supported al Qaeda in Syria (Nusra as well as the Islamic State Group in addition to a number of other terrorist factions) with the pipeline project as a key aspect of its strategic calculus, even sabotaging, in a way, relations with Iran that had been started to improve.

jwtadvice 10y ago

This is just one of the reasons Syria is a National Security interest for other countries. Another is that Ba'athism in Iraq and Syria has aligned itself against Saudi Arabia. Another is that the possibility of autonomous Kurdish regions in Syria threaten to support domestic terrorist organizations in neighboring countries (Kojave). Another is that Syria provides Russia with a Mediterranean base. The gas pipelines are a huge reason, for sure. But it's not the only reason. Many different actors have many different reasons why supporting their side of the proxy war makes financial and strategic sense.