#1521
Post rating: +
wait, people listen to the war neard podcast for current events information about "sarin gas" and not to learn more about the taiping rebellion, the whiskey rebellion, the war of jimsons boot, the gin rebellion, the castlemaine 4x rebellion, and so on... oh
#1522
Post rating: +
Syrian army reports an isis chemical weapons Depo hit by American bombs in deir ex zor

#1523
UNUSUALY COOL
Post rating: +
If Postol is correct, there's an entire body of analysis to be done on the bankruptcy and ill effects of current theories & research on the use of chemical & related weapons in asymmetric warfare, since the most effective use of them under Postol's findings seems to be to weaponize the weapon control regimes themselves against enemy states.
#1524
The chickens always come home
Post rating: +++++
forgive me for posting about afghanistan on the syria thread but i just can't help it since I care about the country too much. Obviously if you are reading this you know they dropped a 21,000 pound bomb on an Afghan town claiming to kill ISIS. I type this while I am sitting in a game studies class watching american nerds discuss legend of zelda. i feel slightly schizophrenic, probably because i haven't taken my diversity meds today. so i am going to try and reach out wherever i can by posting this article about american exceptionalism https://thebaffler.com/salvos/corruptions-of-empire-hansen.

I read little details of what the bomb will do. It will make people's ears bleed in a 1 or 2 mile radius, shatter windows, cause shock attacks in a 5 mile radius. It will wipe everything within 1000 yards. So I go to twitter and the first thing I see is americans discussing what a waste of money this is, some others discussing how sean spicer is fuck job.

how do we develop a language, a syllabus, a vocabulary, a course to teach americans how to talk about others without talking about themselves? how do we teach americans at large to mourn for other people like people (including TERRORISTS)? clearly, america has so much ammunition that the best we can do is hope they don't bomb real sovereign nations to oblivion.]I am so sad and mad. idk.
#1525
UNUSUALY COOL
Post rating: +
ask the nerds how a MOAB would work in zelda
#1526
The chickens always come home
Post rating: +
i am in half mind to disrupt this lecture especially because the guest lecturer today is a dude with a baseball cap telling us what the ethnicity of a game character might be. he is making jokes about undetermined ethnicities because it is hilarious apparently. the thing is probably five people in this room even read the news or know what happened.

cars posted:

ask the nerds how a MOAB would work in zelda


#1527
The chickens always come home
Post rating: ~
but thanks for responding so quick i kinda love you for a moment

cars posted:

ask the nerds how a MOAB would work in zelda


#1528
UNUSUALY COOL
Post rating: ~
ty.
#1529
Dont Mess With Sucess
Post rating: +
Ask them how video games are any different from slot machines and other casino games, since they both at base are arbitrary systems of variable reward schedules meant to keep players involved as long as possible before their thinking brain or draining wallet can escape paralysis and intercede.

And feel free to start a new thread
#1530
Post rating: +
swampman literally tore a thought out of my skuill that i've had ever since someone talked 'bout how much fun they had playing Dungeons & Dragons (the konami slots game) and i dont know whether i like him more or less for the violence hes inflicted 'pon my person.

Edited by your_not_aleksandr ()

#1531
Post rating: ~
I just can't believe the casinos haven't started doing actual video games yet
#1532
The chickens always come home
Post rating: +
so that moment's kinda past because games studies books casually include american military complex and games' role in furthering it. It's like coopted or whatever, a legit concern, a beautiful lip service

swampman posted:

Ask them how video games are any different from slot machines and other casino games, since they both at base are arbitrary systems of variable reward schedules meant to keep players involved as long as possible before their thinking brain or draining wallet can escape paralysis and intercede.

And feel free to start a new thread


#1533
The chickens always come home
Post rating: +
I don't want to do literally what I don't want others to do (talk about games while talking about afghanistan) but yeah the class ended with the revealing results that there are more green characters in games than asians and everyone felt bad so representation matters motherfucking woohoo
#1534
Post rating: +

thirdplace posted:

I just can't believe the casinos haven't started doing actual video games yet



my former landlord ran some sketchy operations in town that included video gambling type machines alongside pay by the hour pc gaming, mostly fps and such. he tried to ask my legal advice about it but i wasnt touching that shit at all. a few months ago i heard about the cops raiding some places like that and arresting a bunch of people. kind of surprised he hasn't popped up in my caseload

why they don't do it in vegas and such, idk. seems like blips n chitz dave n busters does well for itself

Edited by TG ()

#1535
Post rating: ~

xipe posted:

Syrian army reports an isis chemical weapons Depo hit by American bombs in deir ex zor


huge if true

#1536
"Jpg." - Hank Hill
Post rating: +++++
liberalism's emphasis on technocracy is nowhere more prevalent than in their talking about war. they cite, or claim to be, experts, and are therefore important voices. and they are experts, as far as is necessary: they can say the right proper nouns for Leader X or Group Y. then they tell a story that predicts the future that pretends the west was never there but has been forced to be there and can fix things.

technocracy is adjacent to fanboyism, which explains how easily liberals transition into the latter. you see it today with Whoa look at how smart and knowledgeable this (undisclosed weapons contractor lobbyist) colonel is on MSNBC!! or it's 2007. david petreaus is a BAD ASS! he's an extremely qualified general who LITERALLY WROTE THE BOOK on counter-insurgency. he's going to clean up this whole thing lickety split! ten years later iraq is still on fire and he has to notify his parole officer when he gets on an airplane
#1537
Post rating: +
assad strongly criticises regime in latest interview

#1538
Black Belt
Post rating: +

marimite posted:

Listened to the latest War Nerd podcast, and they're saying they think that it came from a rogue element in the SAA. This is after going through all the reasons why the attack was suspicious and why the political leadership understands that such an attack would be disadvantageous. It seems according to their source air to ground munitions is the only plausible explanation for the weapons delivery. Any thoughts?



they claim a rogue actor from the syrian arab army got ahold of chemical weapons when after multiple investigations in 2013 all chemical weapon stocks were taken out of the country by the OPCW, a UN agency. they didnt bother to explain where these new stocks came from. the pentagon claimed some were stashed away at the airbase they cruise-missiled, but less than 20 people died at a base where hundreds of syrian and russian members of the military work. so where did these weapons come from? colin powell? the OPCW itself?

#1539
Post rating: +
Assad answers that question about rogue military towards the end too, also
http://www.aymennjawad.org/19815/myths-militias-and-the-future-of-syria

What are these theories of rogue military based on, has there been any such behaviour before?
#1540
Dont Mess With Sucess
Post rating: +
#1541
Post rating: +
this is one of those threads that if you read it from start to finish you will need to drink a lot in order to maintain your remaining sanity. yep.
#1542
chickeon
Post rating: ~
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/02/turkey-france-kurdish-guerillas-elysee.html
#1543
Post rating: +

swampman posted:



what the woman said about terrorists attacking/shooting at the buses confirmed in news report before the bomb
http://en.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13960125000318


what she (and several other survivors said about luring children together with potato chips confirmed in video



moment of the blast itself, the blue truck which drives by is likely the bomb


apparently driven by a moderate rebel who had been released in a previous deal


the atrocity happened in on the outskirts of the city of Aleppo
http://syria.liveuamap.com/?zoom=11&ll=36.16962,37.06118

the attack was in alqaeda territory and ahrar-al-sham who signed up for the exchange deal were in charge of security.
the carbomb drove up through rebel territory before the blast


200 women & girls are reported missing after the bombing; the worry is that they were kidnapped in the confusion by terrorists.
here is a still from a rebel video watching the attack from behind the trees (video is in a wapo article, they only show ~3 second clip of it)

Edited by xipe ()

#1544
Post rating: +
the civilians were supposed to have been safely in government territory 24 hours before but militants had held them up at the checkpoint.

they were also supposed to have been evacuated in a deal made during the liberation of aleppo granting terrorists occupying aleppo safe passage to Idlib.
when the buses came to evacuate the civilians in December they were set alight and the drivers kidnapped or shot



mainstream media takes:






the day before the bombing CNN retweeted Bana's book deal 4 times.
i counted 1 tweet of theirs announcing re: the murder of 100+ children in the 1st 24 hours following the attack.

meanwhile rebel media activists, #jihadijulian and think-tank experts have as soon as the atrocity was announced been inventing multiple stories it being an attack of the syrian government
#1545
Post rating: +

chickeon posted:

http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/02/turkey-france-kurdish-guerillas-elysee.html



treacherous (along with Salih Muslim praising the US airstrikes against Syria last week and calling for more), but as Assad says in the latest interview the syrian gov judges by actions not by statements & they have not acted against syrian gov yet.


one thing to bear in mind: Iraqi popular mobilisation units/hashd al shaabi are also collaborating with the US regime, but with the express understanding that the americans ISIS demons are worse in the short term and they will fight the american soldiers after ISIS are exterminated if they do not leave.

i dont know if the YPG are telling different players what they want to hear for best advantage or what, but u can compare/contrast a very clear anti-imperialist line from the loudly denigrated PMU vs confusing contradictory lines from the theoretically advanced YPG.

if the YPG did decide to betray syria & the Syrian gov decided to be ruthless (which they never have been in the time i have been since following the conflict from ~2015) they would have an unbalanced dictator at their back.
on the other hand an autonomous region of syria would be a good base for launching peoples war against Turkey

#1546
chickeon
Post rating: ~
if they want to survive they should "betray" their "leadership". im cautiously optimistic since I figured the fake sarin attack would be a turning point letting us see where their priorities really lie and they haven't done anything extremely stupid yet. Salih can catch a hot one to the dome as far as im concerned though
#1547
Post rating: +
mothers of the 200 women & girls kidnapped after the terror attack demand they be returned


this is apparently a voice recording of one of the rebels


i dunno if that can been verified, but just for reference this is one of the most popular Al Jazeera (arabic) shows.


(sorry for all the twitter links)
#1548
Post rating: +

chickeon posted:

if they want to survive they should "betray" their "leadership". im cautiously optimistic since I figured the fake sarin attack would be a turning point letting us see where their priorities really lie and they haven't done anything extremely stupid yet. Salih can catch a hot one to the dome as far as im concerned though



he has some some ok things but continually sends contradictory messages depending on who is interviewing him

The overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad by Isis and rebel groups that are affiliated to al-Qaeda would be a calamity for the world, says the Syrian Kurdish leader Saleh Muslim.


contrast that with strong clear leadership of hassan nasrallah.
this was his response to nuclear-armed "israel" threatening a large scale attack on lebanon recently

#1549
Post rating: +
it occurs to me that even if you take the most fancifully high mortality estimates from the war and then attribute that entire number exclusively to Assad, as shithead ideologues are wont to do, his bodycount is still utterly dwarfed by the Bush administration's

since the USA wants so very badly to adjudicate, i propose we follow the US precedent: let him finish his second term (ending in 2028) and then retire to a life of leisure while formerly hostile elements of the US media gradually decide they actually like him after all
#1550
Post rating: +
it's a nice idea but unfortunately i think they mean to continue the standard practice of execution, either extrajudicial or on the orders of a kangaroo court, to ensure he remains frozen in time as a villain
#1551
Post rating: +
its cool that even after slobadan milosovic was exonerated of war crimes by NATOs own court system he will always be a passionate "worse than hitler" fling in our hearts

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/08/22/claims-of-exoneration-the-case-of-slobodan-milosevic/

The new Adolf Hitler?
http://edition.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/time/1999/03/29/hitler.html
Why we are not wrong to compare Milosevic to Hitler
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/comment-why-we-are-not-wrong-to-compare-milosevic-to-hitler-1088574.html
Milosevic Isn't Hitler, But . . .
http://www.nytimes.com/1992/08/04/opinion/milosevic-isn-t-hitler-but.html

good thing he was denied heart medication while imprisoned against doctors advice and died in mysterious circumstances!!

meanwhile: the families of the 200 women and girls kidnapped by rebels after the terror attack have released a statement and demands to have them returned



Statement from the families of #Fouaa and #Kafraya following the deadly opposition-led bombing that killed and wounded over 400 people:

Families hold Ahrar al Sham, #Nusra, #Qatar and #Turkey responsible for failing to protect and secure the safety of their families
For 2 days the militants procrastinated, keeping the families on the buses with little food, water and exhausted, delaying the evacuation.

In the chaos of the bombing, a large number of their relatives have been kidnapped/ gone missing and they have no news of their whereabouts
The families of #Fouaa and #Kafraya demand the following:

1- all culprits involved in the bombing be handed over the authorities in the Syrian Arab Republic
2- The transfer of the wounded (in opposition areas/ Turkey) to hospitals under the control of the Syrian Arab Republic
3- The commitment of the opposition the continuation of the agreement and completion of the evacuation of residents from #Fouaa & #Kafraya
4- Finding those who have since gone missing and have been kidnapped after this crime
5- Enforcement of international guarantees to ensure the safe evacuations of those from Fouaa and Kafraya
6- Qatar, as the guarantor of the opposition in the agreement, should pay compensation to the families for each martyr and wounded person
7- The UN Security Council to hold an emergency session in order to condemn the attack and hold those states behind the attack accountable
8- Those who accused the Syrian govt and the army of responsibility for the bombing are only trying to clear themselves of responsibility
9- To make Saturday 15th April Children's Day in the Syrian Arab Republic to commemorate those killed in the bombing



i really didnt think the West could get any lower but no politicians have condemned the attack and media has buried the story with no blame assigned (except to insinuate that its a syrian government did it to make the rebels look bad).

the moderate rapists do horrible things to women especially shia. the fear that their bodies will turn up in a massacre blamed on the government are not unfounded i think

Edited by xipe ()

#1552
The chickens always come home
Post rating: ~
more from the games studies class, professor admitted sometimes she needs to go blow things up and womp on things so she plays games with tanks and guns, students agreed, nodded in sympathy.
#1553
Post rating: +
fucking tankies!!
#1554
Online
Post rating: +

spectralmarx posted:

more from the games studies class, professor admitted sometimes she needs to go blow things up and womp on things so she plays games with tanks and guns, students agreed, nodded in sympathy.


when I feel that way I dunk a basketball

#1555
Post rating: ~
what kind of fucked up loser needs to pretend to murder people to feel good about themselves?
#1556
Post rating: +++++
reading a book published by the ISO's publishing arm in 2012 and the preface says there is a good chance that the civil war in syria will turn socialist. just checking into this thread to see if we have a socialist revolution in syria yet
#1557
UNUSUALY COOL
Post rating: +
my predictions show that by 2050, even ISO will have turned socialist.
#1558
Post rating: +


How many splinter fractions do they have?
#1559
Post rating: +
This aussie dude is travelling across Syria at the moment, showing some interesting things

https://m.facebook.com/valenzuelatech?fref=nf&ref=m_notif&notif_t=comment_mention
#1560
Post rating: ~

xipe posted:

How many splinter fractions do they have?



if they witness their "moderate rebel" comrades committing terrorist acts against civilians are they just going to ignore it or what?