blah the Prussian

Oh. Well, even then it's still wrong. Kim Jong Un is a Communist, Communism is opposed to religion, ISIS is a religious fundamentalist group, perfect reason right there.

Welcome to Serenes Field of Mildly Tall Grass. I do hope you enjoy your time here.

True, true; I was merely making a point, rather than throwing my hat in. I don't really care one way or the other.

You know, thats an interesting opinion to have. Lets break your thought process down. Except that ISIS has loudly announced that it plans to conquer a good deal of land belonging to a number of UN member states. Except that practically everything ISIS has ever done violates the UN universal declaration of human rights. Okay, this line of thinking really fascinates me. Lets break it down: You believe that the UN is selling weapons to ISIS. This is outright idiotic. Why would they sell weapons to ISIS? Ah well, whatever half assed argument you come up with won't matter, as there is pretty conclusive evidence that Qatar is the culprit. Moving on, apparently, the UN should be happy with the US tied down by ISIS. Why exactly might that be? The US is a permanent member of the UN security council, and UN headquarters is in New York City. Good god. I honestly have no idea what could possibly be going through your head to make you come to these conclusions. You know, I find self wondering as I read this part: where exactly did this come from? What the hell does North Korea have to do with ISIS? In any case, North and South Korea are technically still at war, and have always had a massively militarized border. That that border continues to be heavily guarded does not mean by any stretch of the imagination that the Korean War is about to restart. So, there you have it. I honestly can't tell if you're trolling or not, but that was completely incoherent. Stop spouting groundless conspiracy theories.

*sigh*

@Chiki: Okay, fair enough, I didn't read the religion discussion in that thread, so thats why I didn't see it.

Well, to be fair, while I am an atheist, there is no proof that there is NOT a god. There is pretty conclusive proof that Kim Jong Un is not benevolent, and that the Germanic people are not the Master Race.

Ah, okay That makes sense. But, if thats the case, could we be controlling bvery large armies of generics backed by an elite core of named units? That could lead to some awesome battles.

Well, its not all that surprising. ISIS does, after all, have the industrial capacity to produce tanks. If, incidentally, they do get their hands on Syrian chemical weapons (highly unlikely, but I suppose possible, given the right amount of incompetence) then that would be the time for a US military intervention. Incidentally, there is no way whatsoever that this will evolve into WWIII. NO ONE likes ISIS, not even North Korea, and thats saying something.

Incidentally, if this is used as a cheap way to make it so that you can recruit the enemy family members, there will be blood.

The optimist in me wants to say that this is true, but the pessimist in me says that Thane is right. The pessimist in me is stronger.

@Phoenix: The problem is that ISIS is not a terrorist organization anymore, it is, in terms of a capacity to make war, a country. The hope is that intervention would bump it back to a terrorist organization. @Chiki: First, They are winning because they have not yet run out of manpower. They are, however, fighting a war of attrition at this point. A war of attrition that their fighting style cannot support. Learn military strategy. Second, why is this so hard? A person is not obligated to protect themselves over others, a leader is obligated to protect their people over other country's people. It's that simple.

Why? A leader of a country, be it a King or a President, has the duty to focus on their country above all else. That is their job. If they put the welfare of the people of other countries over the welfare of their own people, they are being bad rulers. If a person puts the welfare of another over themselves, they are not being a bad person, because that is their choice. A leader speaks for their people, and must act in their best interests. Touché. The notion that these tactics are new is idiotic. ISIS is using the same tactics as Imperial Japan- they combine fanaticism on the battlefield with brutality to inspire fear in the enemy. Their warfare is entirely morale based. They are currently up against the bedraggled Iraqi and Syrian armies, both of whom are glorified National Rifle Associations. If they beat them, however, they go up against the Iranian and Israeli armies, both of which are well trained, led, and equipped. They cannot win. Even if they advance in some areas, they lose in others, like at Tikrit. ISIS essentially suffers from a lack of actual competence, compensating for it with fanaticism; they are similar to the Waffen SS in this regard. If they go up against an army that knows what they're doing they will lose; simple as that.

You cannot apply interactions between people to interactions between nations. The issue here is that the Middle Eastern War is a lot more complicated than one woman being raped. There is no advantage that can be gained from not calling the police in this situation, and it comes at no cost to yourself. By contrast, we don't know if assisting in the Middle East would open up a whole new can of worms. Finally, as I have said before, the forces currently arrayed against ISIS are doing a fine job of beating them, and the US is sending assistance. There are no ethics to international politics, its what is in the best interests of the country that should effect decision making. The Jordanian military is the only one doing the fighting in any war. If citizens want to help, they can join the army. However, you made it sound like there weren't any Jordanians fighting ISIS, which is what I took issue with. Care to elaborate? Not being an ass, just curious. They are solving it. This topic isn't about what the US should do, its what the world, primarily the forces most likely to dictate a peace, should do. And here we get to the root of the problem, eh? It seems inevitable that ISIS will lose, but the question is, will another uprising happen? Maybe the handling of the defeated Germany and Japan could be used as inspiration?

First of all, yes, that was indeed a reply to you. Second of all, I'm not saying we have an obligation to help any country in need, or donate money to help the destitute in Africa, or whatever. What I AM saying is that America has an obligation to assist those nations it has alliances with, such as Iraq and Jordan. We shouldn't be the worlds policeman, but we damn well should be making sure our word means something. Oh, and incidentally, it would raise quite a few questions if I fought ISIS, me being 15 and all. Child soldiers are, after all, illegal.

Incidentally, the average Jordanian pilot is currently doing raids against ISIS positions. As I've said before, I would completely agree with Blaze if it was not the case that the Arab coalition and Iran are winning. As things stand, we should intervene on behalf of our allies if any unfortunate reversals happen. As a side note, I wonder how this period will be talked about in history books? I'm thinking "Great Middle Eastern War".

This is the truest thing that has been said in this thread so far.

Welp, Blaze's point just got proven.

Yeah, I guess so. Its just that Persia adopted much of its culture through assimilation by the Arabs, so ancient Persia doesn't really feel Middle Eastern, unlike the Arabs and Ottomans.

Well, this is a complicated one. I used to be an extremely jingoistically atheistic, except now I don't particularly care. I suppose I'm still an atheist, but I don't give a damn if everyone is an atheist or no one is. That may be surprising to some, as I am a monarchist and have made that rather clear, but I don't believe in any of that divine right crap. I also have the moral compass that essentially says that it is natural for the strong to enforce their will on the weak, and we as humans have proven our superiority by evolving beyond nature. I firmly reject naturalism as nature is a cruel, ruthless place where there is no compassion or remorse. I believe that it would be to the benefit of both animals and humans if we domesticated as many animals as we can. I know my dog is happier than wolves, for example.

Oh no, I'm not talking about promoting "liberty" in the Middle East (what constitutes liberty is subjective anyway), but we should act, as we are now, to stop acts of genocide, which countries are obligated to do under international law. We are also obligated to help our allies in Iraq and Jordan, who are fighting ISIS. That is why we should intervene.

Wasn't Prince of Persia based on the Achameniad Empire, though? They were before Islam.

I'd say that e main issue is that the focus on "liberty" means that Americans feel as though they don't have any obligations, thus ruining the whole basis of the social contract. Then again, America always has been pretty well suited to isolationism. We are surrounded by allies and ocean, and the last time the states themselves were Invaded was over 100 years ago. Quite frankly, we don't have any reason to care, and that is the problem.

"Hello, you are watching FOX NEWS! Today, we shall once again blatantly overinflated the facts in our quest to provide the best argument for censorship in history! Now, lets talk about the video game that lets you play as Nazi ISIS gays!" In all seriousness, I don't think anyone aside from some stupid rednecks will think that.

Ottoman units ahoy! Bashi Bazouk to Janissary is Knight to General. The Ottoman levies promote to the Ottoman Sultan's guard. Pretty basic stuff. Barbary Pirates are assassins. The Barbary Pirates were Libyan soldiers trained to piss off European shipping. So it would make sense for them to be stealthy. Mamlukes are Paladins. The Mamelukes were Egyptian cavalry used by the Ottomans to scout. They would be light cavalry, in contrast to the Sipahis, the elite Ottman heavy cavalry. Finally, the Balkan auxillary units would be Mercs and Heroes. These were soldiers from the Greek, Serbian, Bulgarian, and Romanian population. They were at first mercenaries within the Ottoman army, but if they did well enough they would become high ranking Ottoman nobles, hence the promotion to Hero.