4 ms·

Saudi Arabia carried out an extrajudicial killing in a small, neighboring state. This was carried out in the US. And for all intents and purposes could be consi

by yardie 6y ago

Saudi Arabia carried out an extrajudicial killing in a small, neighboring state. This was carried out in the US. And for all intents and purposes could be considered an act of war against a state that has an unlimited war chest.

ithinkso 6y ago
Turkey has the second largest military in NATO (after US) and by quite a margin
- codebolt 6y ago
  Turkey leadership may well be sympathetic to the Saudis to some extent. Freedom of press doesn't exactly seem like their biggest concern, and they have an authoritarian Muslim ruler.
  - ithinkso 6y ago
    They might be, no doubt. I was mainly objecting (unrelated to the article) to the 'smallness' of the neighboring state and to the fact that if something could be considered an act of war doesn't mean it will be one. Bottomless oil well is a good counter to an unlimited war chest.
  - johnyzee 6y ago
    They 'may be', but they're not. They are on opposing sides of a huge regional political divide, and pretty much in cold war against eachother.
    - toyg 6y ago
      I would argue that in the ME everyone is and is not in cold war with everyone else, at any given time. Erdogan and the Saudis, for example, both helped ISIS... until they didn't. There isn't a fundamental ideological divide, everyone is just jockeying for a few more square-meters of this or that.
      - puranjay 6y ago
        The jockeying isn't for some square meter of land. It's for influence over the muslim world.
        toyg 6y ago
        It was a figure of speech. Influence is what gives you control, of course.
  - objektif 6y ago
    Turkey is totally not friends with Saudi Arabia right now.
  - sharken 6y ago
    Turkey has gone downhill in the last five years due to the actions of Turkish leadership. I no longer see them returning to the path of democracy sadly. The Trump administration are saints in comparison.
zyngaro 6y ago
Turkey isn’t small in any way. It’s a regional powerhouse.
- giancarlostoro 6y ago
  Not to mention and I guess a lot of people dont know this but Turkey was one of the main allies of the USA not too long ago for quite a while at that. It was quite a strategic alliance too. Just look at Turkeys neighboring countries sometime. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkey%E2%80%93United_States_relations https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkey%E2%80%93United_States...
toyg 6y ago
A superpower doesn't go to war over an isolated assassination of (with all due respect to the victim and his family) some random rich kid. Casus belli is invoked only where there was a pre-existing ambition. I don't think the US have any ambition to take over Saudi Arabia, when they couldn't even run Iraq.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  You don't need to go to war. But you certainly also don't need to defend them. See how the UK responded to the Skripal case or Litivenko.
jacquesm 6y ago
And if the United States had an actual leader they would have taken far more action. You could easily make the case that Trump's weak foreign policy stand is what enabled this murder to happen in the first place. The Saudis felt they could get away with this and in fact they did. No repercussions whatsoever.
- godzulu 6y ago
  If only the President had Susan Rice on his team, they could claim a video caused it.
baybal2 6y ago
> small, neighboring state That "small, neighboring state" is a №2 state in NATO

by yardie 6y ago

ithinkso 6y ago

Turkey has the second largest military in NATO (after US) and by quite a margin

codebolt 6y ago
Turkey leadership may well be sympathetic to the Saudis to some extent. Freedom of press doesn't exactly seem like their biggest concern, and they have an authoritarian Muslim ruler.
- ithinkso 6y ago
  They might be, no doubt. I was mainly objecting (unrelated to the article) to the 'smallness' of the neighboring state and to the fact that if something could be considered an act of war doesn't mean it will be one. Bottomless oil well is a good counter to an unlimited war chest.
- johnyzee 6y ago
  They 'may be', but they're not. They are on opposing sides of a huge regional political divide, and pretty much in cold war against eachother.
  - toyg 6y ago
    I would argue that in the ME everyone is and is not in cold war with everyone else, at any given time. Erdogan and the Saudis, for example, both helped ISIS... until they didn't. There isn't a fundamental ideological divide, everyone is just jockeying for a few more square-meters of this or that.
    - puranjay 6y ago
      The jockeying isn't for some square meter of land. It's for influence over the muslim world.
      - toyg 6y ago
        It was a figure of speech. Influence is what gives you control, of course.
- objektif 6y ago
  Turkey is totally not friends with Saudi Arabia right now.
- sharken 6y ago
  Turkey has gone downhill in the last five years due to the actions of Turkish leadership. I no longer see them returning to the path of democracy sadly. The Trump administration are saints in comparison.

zyngaro 6y ago

Turkey isn’t small in any way. It’s a regional powerhouse.

giancarlostoro 6y ago
Not to mention and I guess a lot of people dont know this but Turkey was one of the main allies of the USA not too long ago for quite a while at that. It was quite a strategic alliance too. Just look at Turkeys neighboring countries sometime. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkey%E2%80%93United_States_relations https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkey%E2%80%93United_States...

toyg 6y ago

A superpower doesn't go to war over an isolated assassination of (with all due respect to the victim and his family) some random rich kid. Casus belli is invoked only where there was a pre-existing ambition. I don't think the US have any ambition to take over Saudi Arabia, when they couldn't even run Iraq.

jacquesm 6y ago
You don't need to go to war. But you certainly also don't need to defend them. See how the UK responded to the Skripal case or Litivenko.

jacquesm 6y ago

And if the United States had an actual leader they would have taken far more action. You could easily make the case that Trump's weak foreign policy stand is what enabled this murder to happen in the first place. The Saudis felt they could get away with this and in fact they did. No repercussions whatsoever.

godzulu 6y ago
If only the President had Susan Rice on his team, they could claim a video caused it.

baybal2 6y ago

> small, neighboring state That "small, neighboring state" is a №2 state in NATO