Valery Gergiev blames President Obama for war in Syria
mainIn an interview with German NDR network, airing tonight, the incoming conductor of the Munich Philharmonic attacks the US president for the rise of Islamic State in Syria. Here’s the pre-quote released by the broadcasters:
Gergiev : ‘It is not always Russia that makes the wrong decisions. This is a very honest admission from me… Two years ago, Obama made the wrong decision when he did failed to heed advice by Putin to support the President of Syria, Assad.’
Syria and ISIS are admittedly complicated, but of course Putin’s support of Assad is arguably also a cause of the rise of ISIS, and ISIS has very grisly PR but Assad has killed far more people. He is one of the rulers out there unequivocally worse than Putin; does Gergiev really want to be supporting him, too?
Putin has kinda vanished. That’s now President Gergiev to you!
He is stating the obvious. The US “policy” in the middle east is quite simple. Are you a son of a bitch who sees Iran as a foe? You are our friend (err… useful idiot). Are you a son of a bitch who sees Iran as a friend? We will give lots of money to your enemies, even if they are the worst extremists. Isn’t the prevalent idiocy in the US through all levels of the society wonderful?
That’s simplistic and ridiculous and you don’t offer any worthwhile insight on the issue. The situation in the Middle East is too complicated to make such sweeping, cynical statements valid. And world opinion on US policy is condemned by some, regardless what direction that policy takes; damned if we do, damned if we don’t. The US should not support Assad but there are also good reasons, we now know, for not supporting his enemies. Namely that ISIS has been able to fill a power vacuum in unstable territory in Syria.
Iran’s support of Shia militancy has caused a lot of trouble in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq and continues to be a leading troublemaker in the world.
The “prevalent idiocy in the US through all levels of the society,” if such a statement is valid in any way, is due to the growing militant extremism In the Republican Party and the disinterest in facts and rationality among activists in that party. I think it is the most troubling problem the US faces. How and when this madness can be rolled back and marginalized is not apparent. Those that support the GOP are more accurately defined by region than by class or “level of society.”
Since you are asking for worthwhile insight:
http://www.amazon.com/All-Shahs-Men-American-Middle/dp/047018549X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1426492090&sr=1-1&keywords=iran+revolution+cia
http://www.amazon.com/Blowback-Consequences-American-Empire-Project/dp/0805075593/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1426491960&sr=8-2&keywords=blowback
http://www.amazon.com/Imperial-Hubris-West-Losing-Terror/dp/1597971596/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1426492047&sr=1-1&keywords=american+hubris
You didn’t read what I said and respond to it. And you can tell me what is the most compelling confirmation of your viewpoint. I don’t need to read three books on the subject.
Forgetting about the MIT report that showed it was unlikely Assad who used gas contrary to what the West asserted first… but, let’s not get facts block a good bashing.
Gergiev isn’t blaming the US at all for the war in Syria. He is simply pointing out what is obvious now; that what Assad said was correct, its not a revolution but an attack by outside forces.
Kudos to Gergiev. He is right about Putin’s support of Assad. Anyone following this crisis since 2011 would know that the U.S. has choreographed what began as a clandestine war, and that ISIS was America’s creation, even if it has since become America’s Frankenstein.
But I suppose the naysayers would also claim that the Ukraine’s constitutionally elected President was not overthrown last year by a U.S. supported junta, he just left.
He wasn’t “overthrown” and he didn’t “leave”. He ran under cover of the night with as much of his stolen money as he could, with all his “legitimate” friends.
Then, his own, legal parliament, named a provisional government. There was no junta.
So, you lie about this, and you lie about that.
Yes, and Santa Claus is a nice man.
Good technique.
The sooner you start to lie about things that have just happened, for the whole world to see, the faster people begin to doubt the testimony of their very eyes and their memory.
The putinesque propaganda, and its megaphones of your kind, began to chant this fairy tale about the “violent coup” where Yanukovich was “overthrown” – the day after Yanukovich fled with his bags of money and disappeared for several days.
This is the good, old, Soviet technique of “flabbergasting lie”. The most famous case is that of Dobrynin calmly denying there were any missiles in Cuba while Kennedy was showing him pictures where you could see them quite plainly.
Lately, someone I know was invited to a diplomatic dinner in Riga. Many ambassadors there, including the young, Russian one who declared just as calmly “we have never occupied Latvia”. Absolutely stunned by this blatant lie, nobody reacted.
You people have been to good school.
It’s quite funny how you argue with an imagined straw man. I couldn’t be further from an associate of the evil Soviet empire, but in your cold war calcified mind you can’t think outside of your simplistic box and anybody who is not with you is against you. That’s how little children think.
Anyway, the Russian ambassador might better have said nothing, it was insensitive, but technically he said nothing wrong, because “we” from his point is today’s Russia, not the Soviet Union, and legally these are separate entities, so he is correct in saying that today’s Russia never occupied Latvia.
My Dear Anonymus : I don’t know how close you feel to the “evil Soviet empire”, and I couldn’t care less. All I know is that you speak fluently its propagandist “newspeak”. Comes natural. Even your “cold war” bs comes straight from its textbooks.
As for the Latvian business, it’s an excellent case in point. Your “technically” is just delightful.
As you should know (you really should), Putin is brilliant in getting the best of both worlds, in the “now you see USSR, now you see Russia” kind of game. His Russia claims to be the only legitimate heir of USSR as far as all rights (territorial, political, economic, historical, moral, the whole nine yards) are concerned, but denies any connection with it as soon as it comes to responsibilities.
For instance : the World should know it owes Russia an enormous debt for the victory over fascism, even if it wasn’t Russia, but USSR; but whoever mentions the first two years, one third of the whole WWII, where USSR was fighting hand in hand with Hitler helping him as loyally as it could – is, well, a fascist. And that’s when the aggression, occupation, massive murders and colonization of Latvia took place. But that’s “technically” not Russia.
Or isn’t it, my dear Anon? Because, as it usually does, Putin’s “Id” speaks up ever so often. For instance, as he, repeatedly and notoriously, justifies the pact with Hitler and the Soviet politics in the same period.
My bet is the guy who declared the fall of the USSR to be the “major political disaster of the century”, identifies with it much more than you give him credit for.
Mr Backson,
What I speak is a quite mainstream opinion of educated people in the middle of Europe, who are *not* fully brainwashed by the cold war American mantras. So it would help you not ridiculing yourself further, to stop this funny child cartoon dichotomy that anyone who is not aligned with US brainwashing detergent ingredients is “Putin’s lapdog”. Such infantilism is unworthy of a discussion between adults. Come back when you can argue like an adult. Have a nice day.
The ISIS was just too attractive from a tactical point of view from the US, *not* to be supported. Hitting three targets with one shot:
-Overthrow Assad
-sting Shia Iran with Sunni extremism
-scare irritating Erdogan into compliance
The US foreign policy in the Middle East after WWII: A showcase for idiocy multiplying with hubris, driven by greed.
you are very right , The US interfere in every country where they could make business and mess up the world – Irak, Afghanistan, Syria. Why don’t they just care of their own business?
Let us not forget that the US not ony created IS, but also the Iranian revolution, and apart from the Syrian civil war also began WW II and occupied W-Germany with a capitalist system, was the cause of N-Korea and the Vietnam crisis, and probably caused the Russian revolution in 1917 but various Western historians are still working on that. O yes, the holocaust did not happen but was American/Jewish propaganda to get a foothold in the Middle-East with Israel.
Oh, yeah!
Taking mental refuge in childishness is not really a solution to the massive problems this world faces. But as far as the Iranian revolution is concerned, you are actually not that far off…
The two favorite fairy tales of lazy minds – “Jewish Conspiracies Rule The World” and “USA Is The Cause Of All Problems” – are usually co-written by the same team of fiction creators: Mr. Envy and Mrs. Jealousy. The nearly universal attraction of the lies that are constantly being invented by that always reliable E&J tandem is quite extraordinary. The simple truth is that Jews are not nearly *that* smart and USA is not nearly *that* powerful.
This is just so typical of Putin’s Russian supporters; they hate the West yet they come to work, live and holiday in the West while at the same time they criticize. They also covet Western luxury goods. They are hypocrites, but the West is stupid.
There is also an option of people who think independently, not brainwashed by any of the American or Russian camps. Could you imagine? Probably not…
In Germany the mainstream opinion is quite unlike yours. And they produce a lot of the “western luxury goods” themselves. Your world view seems strange.
News bulletin on my iPhone: “‘In the end’ US must negotiate with Assad to end Syria conflict, Kerry tells CBS News.” Turns out Gergiev was right.
Kerry didn’t say “we should have supported Assad two years ago”. He said “in the end, we must negotiate with Assad”. Not the same thing.
Imagine a Soviet someone saying, in 1941: “in 1939, Americans should have supported us in our alliance with Hitler”. Then Cordell Hull declares “we must support Stalin in his war against Hitler”.
Same thing?
There you are.
Except that Assad didn’t have any alliance with a “Hitler”. Same thing? Not at all.
Now what is the interest of the US in the Middle East again?
Yeah but no but yeah. Check under “Alois Brunner”.
Interesting…
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/14/us/14nazis.html?_r=0
Fun fact : during the “annexation pageant” Putin organized in Russia, one banner caught the attention of some correspondents. Apparently, someone tried to copy the “Je suis Charlie” pattern, but without checking. The banner read : “JE SUIS CRIME”.
Hello, Dr Sigmund.
Only “funny” for those who don’t know French…