Rayvin

Is that you?

Come to think of it, this would be Trident's time to shine.

Technically either we'd fucking have to, or we'd have to say that the whole NATO treaty is a sham and admit that we're afraid of a confrontation with Russia. That said, I'm still not convinced by the Russian military - as a country they're already entirely encircled by the US. Parky, you mentioned a war on multiple fronts but that's exactly what Russia would get too. Can it really take Europe and the US combined - especially with US military bases in Europe? Also, China would surely be checked by India and I'm convinced that Japan haven't just been sitting on their hands for the last 50 years as far as militaristic arming goes. It's worth noting that China only have one aircraft carrier and it's still being repaired - would China really risk going head to head with the US Pacific fleet with such a flimsy navy? Worst case scenario to my mind is a Sino-Russian alliance, but I just don't know if I see it. I reckon the West has it in it to contain this if it happens, but we'd probably lose mainland Europe in the process, and the whole world would go to shit. That said, like fuck is anyone going to let it come to this

Well, we could leave relatively stable if rather brutal regimes in place to run each country, thus ensuring that groups like ISIS have no ability to get started and each country's economy isn't blown up when the bombs dro-- oh no shit, we're systematically purging all of those. Funny how that keeps coming back to bite us... But seriously, it'd be a lot of fucking hard work to restore anything from here. We have no credibility, no trust on a local level, and no genuine regard for the wellbeing of any of the civilians living in these countries - something they're clearly aware of. From the position we currently occupy, there is no easy answer. In principle though, had we not continued to try to 'solve' this with explosives, that would be the answer. What's your solution exactly? How do we win this by force? I don't think we can, so we either have perpetual war, or we actually try to engage the real issues. As for those over here who radicalise, we in the West have our fair share of non-Muslim psychos as well - the US for instance has a huge number of them. Sure they don't have a cause to unite behind, but they exist, and they exist because they're disillusioned with life. I will say however, that the Muslim community in Britain has a general stance, in my opinion, of being more isolationist than many other ethnic groups - this means they're more often on the fringes of society, and are more likely to feel separate and I suppose, more likely to have their disaffected young take up with crazies like ISIS. But with that said, I don't know if I think they're in that isolationist position because of their religion... it could be more about the way that the world now views Muslims in the fallout of terrorism.

Gotta hate Pardew. Even when he's not running our team he's still managing to fuck things up for us against Sunderland

Are they rising in line with or ahead of inflation? Serious question, am actually curious.

It'd be a better use for the money we're about to waste blowing them up. And as for the first point, I'm just curious really as to why all Muslims aren't blowing themselves up. I wonder why this particular group were more susceptible to radicalisation... if it was simply the persuasive power of Islam, surely everyone would be doing it. Clearly there are other factors at play, and therefore, there are other factors that can be addressed.

Pardew continuing his impressive run against Sunderland...

I think it was directed more at the farmers and such who actually make up ISIS as a core group. There's always going to be disaffected loonies, but you can minimise it by investing in more widespread education. If they were blowing themselves up because their religion told them to, why aren't the other billion Muslims doing it?

Frankie Boyle on this particular debate: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/23/frankie-boyle-fallout-paris-psychopathic-autopilot He's kind of sat across the fence of the whole thing as it has turned out on here, save for the point where he rightly concludes that bombing ISIS will offer absolutely no solution whatsoever, and only education and better opportunity can stop the rise of radical Islam.

Charnley is on about £100k/annum... which is startlingly small.

If they do get rid of him Perez only has himself to blame. Another example of chronic mismanagement of a football club from the very top. Who on earth can they possibly get to come in? Guardiola is impossible and they've already exhausted a lot of the normal contenders... who is left?

Which will actually only make it worse.

What is that quote even supposed to mean

I give up. That comment has done for me. I just give up. Some of you guys are in absolute denial about what we're doing because you're so focused on hatred for ISIS. I get the latter but it's the former that's fueling more death on both sides.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/18/life-as-a-drone-pilot-creech-air-force-base-nevada FFS - there's a story in there about a drone pilot following a couple of guys with a camel. He follows them for ages and, in his mind, he doesn't think they're a threat, they've done nothing suspicious, but he's told to blow them up anyway. He waits until they settle down for the night and wipes them out. Surely that is the very definition of 'Targeting innocent people and executing them'. The only possible thing you could argue is that the US clearly thought that these guys were terrorists, without any actual proof of this - but the US has been so consistently (see some of Parky's vids) wrong about who is and is not a terrorist, that it is now wholly fair to argue that their sheer incompetance means that allowing them to continue with this is tantamount to 'targeting innocent people and executing them'. And that's a kind way of looking at it. The other view is that they're hitting people indiscriminately because they now consider everyone over there to be a viable target.

But the point is, these drone pilots were targeting civilians without any serious consideration of whether or not they were legitimate targets - and were being encouraged to do this. How is that different? Also, Nazi Germany had the power to effect a global reich. ISIS are a group of 30,000 farmers who we are only involved with because there are resources we want in that region.

Or those poor souls in that Red Cross hospital that the US blew up.

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/nov/20/crystal-palace-eagle-kayla-charlton-punch Not that we don't have previous in the animal punching stakes, sadly.

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/nov/20/ayoze-perez-newcastle-united-steve-mcclaren McClaren doesn't want to rush giving him a new contract. Still has to prove himself apparently.

I understand - and you're right. This is something of a rotating debate given that everyone is saying similar things, and I'm well aware that everything I've said has been put across by other people over the last few days. Maybe it's all just cathartic.

Actually, to be totally fair to you, I would agree with the point about general moral superiority in a sense; obviously we would think our society is more moral, as we live in it, but by our standards ISIS and many civilisations in the ME are morally inferior. And I'm not saying really that ISIS wouldn't be here in some form without our intervention anyway - but we have absolutely made this matter worse, and our governments are resorting to many of the same tactics as they are. I think what I'm keen to be is a 'moderate Westerner' publicly decrying our military action as not being acceptable - much as we expect moderate Muslims to do on behalf of ISIS.

You don't think the slaughter of children voids the moral highground for us? You'd rather look at something absolutely hypothetical rather than something that has actually happened?

Yes well, we don't seem to have much choice now. But if the core points here to my mind are a) we're killing more civilians than they are, and have drone pilots blowing up children they deem to be suspicious and getting career death tallies in excess of 1500 people - I'm not saying we shouldn't be (although I think we shouldn't be) but I can't accept that this is morally different to what ISIS are doing, I think you're just burying your head in the sand; and b )our continued intervention is making this worse. That said, given the way the deck is stacked, I see no option but to just keep bombing until there's no one left to destroy. That's the only way to win this overall fight against jihadism. Had we addressed it with tolerance and education, we wouldn't be here IMO, but it's probably too late for that now.

Oh, perhaps I'm wrong with that one then. I think at best there's debate about it but I hadn't realised that it wasn't fact. Fine, I retract that. It doesn't really change the colour of my point though, and this discussion about nukes is taking us away from the actual issue which is about things that are happening, not things that potentially could but actually never will happen.