Russian SU-24 shot down by Turkey.

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by calgaryblood

You really believe no drugs come in to the USA on planes? Tankers? Big rigs?

Originally Posted by calgaryblood

A lot of drugs come to the U.S through Mexico on planes and the U.S can't control that. A much smaller and weaker country like Turkey now should be an expert at stopping these guys?

Its over a 100,000 barrels a day, which is 16,000m3. That's not a small volume to secretly sneak across the border.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

Its over a 100,000 barrels a day, which is 16,000m3. That's not a small volume to secretly sneak across the border.

It is a lot of swallowed condoms.

[calgaryblood]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

Turkey and their military isn't small or weak.

Compared to the U.S they are.

[calgaryblood]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

Its over a 100,000 barrels a day, which is 16,000m3. That's not a small volume to secretly sneak across the border.

Where's that number from?

[VladtheImpaler]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

He's the least trustworthy and hardest to read out of all the leaders in the conflict. I wouldn't be surprised if there was some aspirations to crush the Kurds and claim portions of Syria for the old empire.

It's much like Putin and Chechnya - which is the cart and which is the horse? Is the crushing of the Kurds the goal or are the Kurds just a pretext to rally nationalist forces to gain more power?

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by calgaryblood

Compared to the U.S they are.

yeah, there is a long and extensive list of "world powers" that can't touch the size of the US military.

Spoiler!

[calgaryblood]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

yeah, there is a long and extensive list of "world powers" that can't touch the size of the US military.

Spoiler!

Of course which is why I originally was comparing it to the U.S and how they can't even control illegal trades.

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by calgaryblood

Where's that number from?

Looks like its much less now, 35-40,000 barrels a day. I looked for where I read the 100k but it might have been from ages ago. Still a significant amount is smuggled into Turkey in trucks, boats, vans, and apparently secret cross border hoses.

http://ig.ft.com/sites/2015/isis-oil/

[calgaryblood]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

Looks like its much less now, 35-40,000 barrels a day. I looked for where I read the 100k but it might have been from ages ago. Still a significant amount is smuggled into Turkey in trucks, boats, vans, and apparently secret cross border hoses.

http://ig.ft.com/sites/2015/isis-oil/

From your article

" Syrian and Turkish border towns have co-operated by burying small rubber tubes under the border, such as at Besaslan. In recent months, Turkey has stepped up border patrols and are constantly digging out the makeshift pipelines."

Doesn't seem like Turkey is turning a blind eye and no one has proved anything just false accusations from Russia who has their own agenda protecting Assad and his regime.

[2Stonedbirds]

Putin and his agenda?

How about the wests agenda at removing Assad? Arming rebel forces, either directly or indirectly arming and/or providing motivation for groups like ISIS, claiming to be fighting terrorism and when Russia offers to throw their hat into the ring Kerry, Obama et all throw their hands up and exclaim "woah woah woah!" Wouldn't want to disrupt the master plan now would we?

It's all a bunch of BS, being flown under the "humanitarian" flag and to pretend the west has no stake in this is to be ignorant. However now that Russia has entered the fight I suppose we now have a convienent scapegoat.

[calgaryblood]

You must have zero understanding about the region if you really believe that. Russia needs Assad. The Russians are only fighting ISIS to protect Assad. They have been hitting targets other than ISIS. The Turksmen are being bombarded by Russia. Why wouldn't Turkey be upset especially when they enter Turkey airspace to do it?

The Russians aren't there to fight ISIS they're there to fight the rebels who appose Assad and have been persecuted by Assad.

Russia has one goal. Protect Assad at all costs.

[2Stonedbirds]

Yes, Assad asked Putin, his ally, for help fighting the American backed rebels.

Putin also said they would help in the effort in fighting ISIS, which they have been doing.

The US also has a history of overthrowing democratically elected officials in order to further their agenda.

To claim Putin has some sort of sinister agenda while turning a blind eye to the US running roughshod over ME countries in the name of energy makes everyone look stupid.

[FlameOn]

Erodogan says Russia should apologize for violation of it's airspace

Russia should apologise for violating Turkey's airspace, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as saying on Thursday, days after a Russian jet was shot down near the Syria border.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/1...0TF1NU20151126

It's hilarious that he just went and shat on Russia while the entire Western world was watching then follows up and insults Russia a second time while hiding behind NATO protection. His country and Islamist followers have been linked to buying of ISIS oil, shipping weapons to ISIS fighters and running an ISIS hospital in Turkey. Why is NATO protecting this guy again?

[T@T]

There are three types of people that would defend Turkey.

Turks, Jerks and Sunni Muslims.

[sharkov]

Turkey is like a scrawny guy that travels around with a 6'-9" strong friend and throws cheap shots at people.

[FlameOn]

Erdogan arrests the two journalists that exposed Turkish intelligence on shipping weapons to ISIS and Turkmen Syrian rebels.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/pro...&NewsCatID=339

[Chingas]

^ This is not exactly true. The Turks are and have to be tough all on their own. Look at their geographic position and all of their neighbors. They have needed to be strong for a long time to retain what real estate they have. The Turks do not take #### from anyone, and have to be wired that way or else they would have been absorbed long before Nato came along.

I am not saying that I can agree with all of their current policies and the games that are being played, but I don't think I can agree with any policies currently being played out by any player at this moment in time.

We will never really know the exact motives of the Russian fly over, nor do i think that we will know for fact that adequate warning was given, to much he said she said I think. I do not feel sorry for the Russians though as Imo they are testing everyone, and pushing the boundries at every opportunity. Just so happens they got called on their bluff this time.

So now the Russians have responded by bombing a ####load of Turken areas which more than likley are not ISIS related. I think it is embarrissing that all of the world powers are now having a proxy war that is trading your allies lives for our allies lives. There are plenty of deserving ISIS a-holes that deserve everythign that they are getting, but how many citizens who just want to live life and help their family survive are being caught up in this unnecessary game of pawns?

To be honest the fact that Russia is supporting an elected leader and we are supporting rebels doesn't sit right with me. To me it deosn't matter that we think we are supporting the "good", we are meddling with policy that comes off as the height of hypocracy. Does anyone think that most this is not related to oil? If it was obvious that we were fighting ISIS and the end game was to rid the world of them then I could get on board, but it is becoming very obvious that there are much different motives at play.

[Itse]

On the oil trucks.

Yes, obviously the US could have started bombing those any time they wanted. It's not exactly hard to find tanker trucks that hang around oil fields. The semi-official reason (from unnamed military sources) why they haven't done this before is because those trucks are operated by civilians, not ISIS, and they're kind of an important part of the infrastructure in the Middle-East.

After the Paris attacks however US has clearly re-evaluated that policy.

http://uk.businessinsider.com/us-isis-oil-trucks-2015-11?r=US&IR=T

On Monday, US planes destroyed an estimated 280 ISIS oil trucks near the border between Syria and Iraq, NBC reported, citing unnamed US officials. The strike was carried out by A-10 Warthogs and AC-130 Specter Gunships.

In a statement, the US-led coalition said that near the cities of Al-Hasakah and Deir ez-Zor, one attack destroyed 283 ISIS vehicles.

The US actually dropped leaflets to warn the truck drivers before they dropped the bombs. So it might really be that they actually cared.

[calgaryblood]

I don't buy that reason. The U.S let ISIS profit and make more money so they can become bigger and buy more and more weapons because they cared about civilians? I mean I'm sure they cared a little but that didn't stop them from killing 125,000 innocent civilians in Iraq.

Civilians or not you need to bomb the crap out of anything ISIS related. I know it's a tough decision but you can't let them continue to make money off oil. It just makes ISIS stronger and kills more innocent people in the long run.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by calgaryblood

I don't buy that reason. The U.S let ISIS profit and make more money so they can become bigger and buy more and more weapons because they cared about civilians? I mean I'm sure they cared a little but that didn't stop them from killing 125,000 innocent civilians in Iraq.

I don't necessarily disagree, but you also have to remember it was a different government back then.

I also think there's no denying that the Obama government is trying to avoid civilian casualties. Last number of civilians killed in the current Syrian campaign I've seen, from a source lambasting US for murdering civilians btw, was something like 480.

That is IMO a really low number for a prolonged air bombing campaign.

Besides, many strategic experts have called the deaths of civilians one of the key factors that is feeding anti-US extremism in the Middle-East. We can simply assume that Obama is listening to that advice, which at its core is a strategic military-political consideration, not humanitarian policy.

So there's no need to think that somehow the US military/government has suddenly turned into a bunch of hippies. We don't even have to assume that civilian casualties is the only consideration, as obviously they are willing to prioritize other things at times.

But I think it's not far fetched to think that avoiding civilian casualties and trying to not destroy infrastructure could really be one angle being taken into account, out of many.

Civilians or not you need to bomb the crap out of anything ISIS related. I know it's a tough decision but you can't let them continue to make money off oil. It just makes ISIS stronger and kills more innocent people in the long run.

The US (or anyone) could just bomb the oil fields too. That would certainly put a wrench in the ISIS war machine. But nobody is doing that. Not even the countries that do not benefit from that oil at all, like Iran.

Anybody could go in and bomb those fields into oblivion, as their locations are well known, they're easy targets and ISIS has no air defense. So why is it that it's not being done?

Another thing they could do is destroy the roads. The Middle-East doesn't really have that many good roads. Another really easy target that's guaranteed to cause big problems for ISIS.

But you can't destroy the country if you're trying to save it.