The Icelandic singer said she found it odd that the United States was shocked that 9/11 happened.
    • Cris@lemmy.worldEnglish
      126·
      3 months ago

      She’s not wrong that most foreign terrorist threats the US faces were radicalized by our own political and military involvement in other regions

      • Enkrod@feddit.org
        129·
        3 months ago

        A (very simplified) timeline of US intervention in the middle-east.

        1. Iran democratically elected a secular leader, but he wanted to use iranian oil for iran. So the CIA instead helped the Shah into dictatorial power, who would sell the drilling rights to american and british companies. He opressed his populace so bad, that they turned to Ayatollah Khomeni and his religious extremists to get rid of him. The religious zealots have been in power ever since.

        2. To fight against the Ayatollah Regime that drove out western oil companies, the US illegally bypasses a weapons embargo to arm a neighbouring dictator called Saddam Hussein. He wages the first Gulf War on Iran for 8 years, which results in ~750.000 dead. The poison gas attacks happen with the knowledge of the US.

        3. Russia invades Afghanistan, the US arms local resistance fighters, a group called Al Quaeda under one Osama bin Laden. To help the islamists against the godless Russians, thousands of mercenaries and religious extremists from muslim countries are recruited by the CIA and brought to Afghanistan, they become the Taliban. More than a million civillians die.

        4. Saddam Hussein, seeing no win against Iran instead invades the absolutist, slavetrading monarchy of Kuwait. Kuwait had opened it oil-wells to western companies, so with the help of the CIA and an american PR-agency, the daughter of Kuwaiti ambassador pretends to be a nurse and lies about Iraqi soldiers ripping babies out of incubators. The world is shocked. What follows is the second Gulf War. More than a million dead civillians again.

        5. Following this second gulf war, american troops are stationed in the gulf region protecting “western values” (the oil wells). The religious extremists in Afghanistan are not amused, the sheer existence of nonbelievers on holy ground is blasphemy to them. Al Quaeda (formerly funded by the US and the House of Saud) begin their campaign against the west.

        6. Following September 11 2001 the US invades first Afghanistan, then Iraq and don’t really bother with the long-term stabilizing of a region they so effectively destabilized. From the chaos rises the Islamic State.

        • Mango@lemmy.world
          27·
          3 months ago

          Jesus Christ, where have you been for the past half my life where I couldn’t find a good explanation of any of this?

          • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
            16·
            3 months ago

            To be fair, I grew up with this shit too, and while I refuse to denigrate public education, the degree to which our curriculum is manipulated to tell a particular story from a particular point of view is hard see as anything other than indoctrination in hindsight. It takes a while to mentally pull oneself out of that sort of thing, particularly when it occurs in our formative years.

            But also: there have been a number of disclosures and revelations about the history enumerated in the post you replied to in the last decade - for example, the whole saga around the Iran Coup, and how it was largely instigated by BP (of deepwater horizon fame) and essentially occurred because the Tehran CIA station chief basically stopped listening to orders from DC to back down and yolo’d the fucking thing. That’s not to say the government at large is blameless in that particular case, but it was WAY more complicated and fucky than most people realized until very recently.

            • Mango@lemmy.world
              3·
              3 months ago

              I’m lucky to have recognized the indoctrination stuff as far back as elementary school. I’ve essentially always been hyper fixated on manipulation tactics seemingly since birth.

        • breckenedge@lemmy.world
          6·
          3 months ago

          We invaded Iraq (2nd time) after dubious claims from a dissident that they had WMDs. Germany even told us not to listen to this guy.

    • Draghetta@lemmy.world
      49·
      3 months ago

      That’s rich coming from someone who threatens to intervene with her army if someone complains to her

    • CALIGVLA@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      14·
      3 months ago

      … Wait, Iceland doesn’t have an army?

      …

      Time to invade Iceland guys, they’ve had it far too good for a while now!

  • whaleross@lemmy.world
    12·
    3 months ago

    In the American mindset, their own wars are fought by the poor people and in faraway countries. Both unrelatable on a personal level, both expendable for political rhetoric and engaging news entertainment.

    • APassenger@lemmy.world
      7·
      3 months ago

      “Fought by losers (and no one I know) in countries that deserve it.”

      ~ Trump probably, but with worse structure.

  • Mango@lemmy.world
    9·
    3 months ago

    It’s exactly like how kids get bullied and bring a gun to school. If you hit someone, don’t cry about it when they hit you back because you aren’t getting any sympathy. If you treat someone unfairly, is it out of line when they hit you below the belt?