Replies

But what Ron Paul said is, in fact, utterly uncontroversial and utterly true. Nowhere did Paul suggest ala Ward Churchill that the U.S. deserved to be attacked, he merely sought to explain the motives of those who attacked us. His explanation was certainly incomplete and a bit ham-handed, but it was not inaccurate or blatantly false.

Male Bovine Fecal Effluvia. The Jihadists would have attacked us because of our culture and our freedom regardless if we were in Saudi or not. They hate us because of who we are.

Ron Paul said that it was because of American interventionism that we were attacked. I'm not buying it.

What about the first WTC attack? What about the Marines that were killed in the early 1980s in Beirut? Were we in Saudi back then?

What about the hostages the Iranians took in 1979? It's true you can argue this was in reaction to the Shah and his policies and that we were supporting him, but I don't think by any stretch this is the complete answer to the question.

What about the Marines that were killed in the early 1980s in Beirut? Were we in Saudi back then?

Actually we, and I do mean we, were in Lebanon. That's why they attacked us in Lebanon you frigging twit.

You're conflating terrorist groups.

AQ is a sunni organization that was founded during the insurgency against the russians in Afghanistan. Their primary goals are the conquest of Saudi Arabia and the middle east. AQ's goals, members and motivations differ from all of the other terror groups and attacks you mention.

The WTC itself was considered an insult to Islam in general. A little known fact about the WTC is that the Japanese architect who designed it used many islamic elements in its construction. You can read more about what I'm talking about here:

http://www.slate.com/?id=2060207

The Beirut attacks and possibly the first WTC attack were based on American support for Israel and the American occupation of Lebanon along with the Israelis. The Iranian came from the US's support for the shah(note that the shi'ites would love nothing more than to slaughter sunni AQ and vice versa).

So Ron Paul has a point. American intervention in the middle east *does* inflame terrorism in the middle east.

However please don't take this argument as my position against US intervention. The US *should* intervene in the middle east, but US intervention has to be tempered with realism(US policy makers should not be surprised when groups rebel against American intervention) and stoicism(you are going to take causalities, this should be expected, this whole "we will be welcomed as liberators" BS needs to be replaced with a fundamental understanding that we have have a job to do, and should do it right).

We have had a military presence in Saudi Arabia for decades, so the answer to your question is “Yes.”

And if we don’t learn how our enemy thinks, we can never devise the proper stratagem to defeat him. Hate to be the one to tell you this, but Dr. Paul IS correct on this.