The Coming Arab Revolt

Strategy Page ^ | 12-15-04 | Austin Bay

[motorola7]

Mark it on your calendar: Next month, the Arab Middle East will revolt.

However, generals with tanks and terrorists with fatwas won't be leading the revolution. This time, Arab moderates and liberal reformers -- the Middle East's genuine rebels -- are the insurgent vanguard.

[motorola7]

this site has the best and most realistic analysis of what is actually happening in Iraq.

[shibumi]

I hope and pray that you're right - but I'll believe it when I see it.

[oolatec]

Arabs standing up for themselves? It will never happen.

[SittinYonder]

this site has the best and most realistic analysis of what is actually happening in Iraq.

Could you please ping Porter Goss to it. They need some help at CIA.

[Asclepius]

This time, Arab moderates and liberal reformers -- the Middle East's genuine rebels -- are the insurgent vanguard.

The whole Arab world will suddenly wake up from its fifteen hundred year insanity? Yeahright. Any day now.

[LoneRangerMassachusetts]

Mark it on your calendar: Next month, the Arab Middle East will revolt

And Ted Kennedy will congratulate Bush.

And Europe will give up antisemitism

And aliens will arrive in UFO's passing out tickets to heaven.

[Travis McGee]

I'll mark it on my calender.
Yawn.

[shibumi]

Actually, I rate the last of your predictions as the most likely.

[Mitchell]

Ping. We'll see soon enough what happens.

[Paleo Conservative]

I thought they were already revolting.

[konaice]

Ok, book marked it just so I can taunt you next month
about how wrong you are. ;-)

[hosepipe]

You're a dreamer Austin whats your last name...."POWERS""

[Straight Vermonter]

Everyone should read the rest of the article to see what the writer is getting at.

[sarah_f]

Sorry, but that 'assessment' is the stupidest thing I have read in two years.

[MikefromOhio]

errr ummm no I dont think so....

Being in Iraq right now, I feel I have a pretty good feeling about what is going on.

Even though the Iraqis are having their election, it probably isnt going to go our way. We are going to be a majority Shia legislature. The Sunnis will not like that. So there just might be a bit of a Civil War. No big deal, it wont be any worse than what is going on right now.

but saying that the palestinians and the Iraqis going to the polls will cause some sort of reformers revolt is ludicrous. It is a step in the right direction, but only a baby step in a 100 mile journey.

[dk/coro]

I am not at all sure what kind of water Austin Bay has been drinking, but his analysis of the Middle East terra-firma has about as much validity as Hillary's Grand Jury testimony had --ZIP!

We shall be committed to the re-surging strategic challenge to Western Democracy posed by Islamist militancy for decades; and we had better get used to some tough commitments. Before too long --probably sometime after the next serious "event" within CONUS -- we will see universal military conscription; and, finally, a serious dedication of the collective populace to the mortal threat to Western Civilization -- and the very fabric of our culture.

Europe is already lost; and Austin Bay has certainly not demonstrated with his piece, that he has even a clue as to the magnitude (and breadth) of the threat facing our Republic.

(I suspect he is a bit wet behind the ears -- and somewhat weak in his Islamic history).

Goodnight -- and have a Joyous Christmas Season.

[broadsword]

I thought they were always REVOLTING.

[SunkenCiv]

Found this lonely link on your links page. Thanks, hadn't seen this topic ten months ago when it was posted. Love this:

Put a circle around Jan. 9. That's the day Palestinians go to the polls to elect a president. In the desperate, divided and terrorized Palestinian statelet, electoral politics (ballots) are replacing pistol politics (bullets). That is a revolution -- a worldview-shattering, history-creating revolution.

The Arabs went to the polls that day and voted heavily for Hamas candidates.

The death of Yasser Arafat hammers a remaining fragment. Interim Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas is seizing the opportunity with unexpected boldness. This week, Abbas called the second intifada a mistake. While proclaiming the Palestinians' right to "resist (Israeli) occupation," he insisted on using peaceful means. Abbas thus frames the election as a choice between responsible, peaceful politics and extremist violence.

[howls of derisive laughter, Bruce]

In order to end war, the warlike enemy has to die.

In order to kill 'em, we have to dry up financing. Best way is to drill the ANWR and any other place (such as offshore, or under the Great Lakes) that comes to mind, and develop shale, oil sands, synfuels from coal... and of course, tax oil imports to and exports from the US. That encourages drilling at home, and discourages exports.