A Syria Expert – Twelve Month Ago

October 25, 2013

A Syria Expert – Twelve Month Ago

Twelve month ago an often quoted academic and so called expert on Syria tweeted the following:

Aleppo falling to FSA. Rebels take al-Syrian Jadide, heart of Christian area. #syria #aleppo
4:46 AM – 25 Oct 12

al-Syiraan Adime just fell to rebel militias as well. Center of Aleppo fallen. #syria #aleppo
4:52 AM – 25 Oct 12

Syria Regime Gives up Aleppo. FSA sharpshooters on top of all buildings in a-Syrian jadide and Qadime, Christian heartland #Syria #Aleppo
4:54 AM – 25 Oct 12

Shooting has stopped totally in Aleppo. Eerie silence overtakes city as government relinquishes control and Rebels take over. #Syria #Aleppo
5:09 AM – 25 Oct 12

@FareedZakaria #syria Aleppo has fallen to rebels. Government gives up control as eerie silence decends over city.
5:12 AM – 25 Oct 12

Those hilarious illusions though, ended a few hours later:

Gov tanks descend on Faisal street – main road near al-Syriaan jadide, Rebel troops retreat into Ashrafiya. #syria #aleppo
12:33 PM – 25 Oct 12

Depending on the insurgency's propaganda for information, working with a simplistic sectarian mental model of the complex Syrian society and having zero experience in the art of war is the base of such sorry expertise.

Experience based realistic interpretation of all available facts would certainly provide for better analysis. Unfortunately there are few real practitioners of such a process in U.S. foreign policy discussions.

Posted by b on October 25, 2013 at 04:37 UTC | Permalink

Comments

@98 All I do is post on MOA. Same as you. I’m ineffectual and I know it. Like most people the best I can do is try to insulate myself and my family.
You think Russell Brand is going to start a revolution? I don’t. Actually I think he needs to come up with some new material or people will get fed up with him and start looking for a new entertainer. Apathy that’s the problem Hoarse. People are complacent. Nothing will happen until things get considerably worse for the middle-class.

Posted by: dh | Oct 30 2013 0:38 utc | 101

“I thought most people had a grasp of the concept the “medium is the message””
He also said that “the medium is the massage”
He seemed to think it was quite clever, from his tone of voice when he said it.

Posted by: foff | Oct 30 2013 0:39 utc | 102

@100 Spooked? How so? The 1% will be watching carefully to see if Brand has anything serious to say. But spooked? Nah. They know his game. They pay his wages.

Posted by: dh | Oct 30 2013 0:45 utc | 103

@102
He’s just so damned ingenious and wily, how could anyone possibly hope to score a point against the man? Maybe he IS the Messiah. Where’s my Russell Brand mask?

Posted by: JSorrentine | Oct 30 2013 0:50 utc | 104

sorry
to clarify : I was not clear but the person I was referring to when I said “He also said . . etc” was MacLuhan
Wiki
“The title is a play on McLuhan’s oft-quoted saying “The medium is the message”. The book was initiated by Quentin Fiore.[1] McLuhan adopted the term “massage” to denote the effect each medium has on the human sensorium, taking inventory of the “effects” of numerous media in terms of how they “massage” the sensorium.”
I think the fan-bois are just more susceptible to this particular “massage” of the sensorium.

Posted by: foff | Oct 30 2013 1:04 utc | 105

@105
And given the world we live in I immediately had thought you were referring to this:
MTV Movie Awards: Russell Brand Says He Gave John Travolta a Massage to Thank Him
and went looking for the exact quote. I’m going to take a shower now…

Posted by: JSorrentine | Oct 30 2013 1:14 utc | 106

Where does Brand stand on Israel? I googled it and just saw some links of fellow Brits trying to dissuade him from performing there.
Anyone who supports vanity states for disaffected ethnic groups is no revolutionist.

Posted by: ruralito | Oct 30 2013 1:28 utc | 107

“…revolution against something is pointless if there’s no thought put into what you are having a revolution in favour of.”
Nothing more need be said on the Russell Brand matter but it would be mistaken not to notice that much of the criticism of Brand’s opinions is profoundly reactionary.
The above quotation from foff (hmm… I’n trying to recall where I used to hear that tone) is an argument against any revolution.
Brand is suggesting that the current dispensation cannot endure and will be changed by an angry populace. He pointed to several matters that must be addressed. As I recall he spoke of the need to end the threat to the planet’s environment and of the obscenity of the increase of wealth for the few and the impoverishment of the many.
These are things which need to be said. That he said them doers him credit. As to his personal behavior, bodily hygeine or religious convictions I care nothing. It surprises me that anyone else here worries about such celebrity trivia.
Incidentally, JSorrentine,you mention Movie Awards, very recently Brand, at a ceremony in London, was cut off after he started pointing out that one of the sponsors, Hugo Boss, began business designing uniforms for NAZIs. It did him credit to do so.
My guess is that Brand is shrewd enough to realise that he is getting in on the ground floor of the tide of ideas that will soon be flooding through society. If his reputation and popularity benefit thereby we will all be better off.
Do people people resent John Lennon for the royalties Imagine has earned? Or suspect Woody Guthrie of grandstanding by writing the Dustbowl Ballads. Or Bruce Springsteen for reviving Tom Joad? Or Brecht for turning the commercial stage into a podium for dangerous ideas?
Of course they do.
The reactionaries hate nothing more than to see one of their tame entertainers crossing the picket line and joining the people. Personally, like many others here and around the world, I’m glad to see them. I would hate for them to be driven back to “apolitical” or neutered mindlessness by those pretending to purer than them. Not to mention agents of reaction posing as red hot revolutionaries.

Posted by: bevin | Oct 30 2013 1:49 utc | 108

Translation of the above
Oh quick, over here: the NAZI’s – they’re like “:The WORST people ever” and given all that’s happened in the world these last 10 years it’s totally REBEL to diss the NAZI’s, and my hero referenced them in an irrelevant rebel-pose sometime somewhere ergo he’s got balls o’steel and worth ten times any o’ you godammed non-Fanboi ingrates!
Sensorium massages are sacrosanct!”

Posted by: foff | Oct 30 2013 19:12 utc | 109

@108 Interesting examples bevin. Brecht, Guthrie, Lennon, Springsteen (even perhaps Jagger the street-fighting man who lives in a French chateau?) have all had an impact on leftist (sorry to use that word) thinking. Perhaps they have even ascended to the stature of radical icons.
But I just can’t include Mr. Brand in that illustrious company. Not yet anyway. Yes he says the right things and he is mildly entertaining but I find him opportunistic. Also he may well be sincere (the best salesmen believe in their product) but I question the attention span of his audience.
I’m happy to let Brand fade away. At least until his next publicity stunt.

Posted by: dh | Oct 30 2013 23:03 utc | 110

“the NAZI’s – they’re like “:The WORST people ever””
Haha. What is this? A tepid defense of the nazis now?
Please, as if you needed to make it even more crystal clear where you’re coming from.

Posted by: guest77 | Oct 31 2013 0:43 utc | 111

“Haha. What is this? A tepid defense of the nazis now?”
what a borderline-retarded thing to say. Amazing how quickly the lefties get downright dishonest when one questions their blind-worship for a “pathetic-excuse for ah hero” like Brand.

Posted by: foff | Oct 31 2013 7:47 utc | 112

100) :-)) LOL – I am sure there is no contradiction between “revolution” and being a follower of the Dalai Lama.

Posted by: somebody | Oct 31 2013 9:05 utc | 113

You ran from that quick, as you should have. Moron.
You seem to have more vitrol stored up for a shaggy nobody than you do for the Nazi murderers.
Typical right wing moron.

Posted by: guest77 | Nov 1 2013 0:33 utc | 114

The reality of the nazis is not the relevant point. The point is the use of ‘the nazis’ as trope.

Posted by: Rowan Berkeley | Nov 1 2013 4:44 utc | 115

http://www.innercitypress.com/syria2kurdshimi102713.html
http://www.innercitypress.com/syria1khandelay103113.html

Posted by: Mina | Nov 1 2013 10:06 utc | 116

Determined to “win” at all costs, bevin and guest77 seemed destined to “godwin” themselves to into a permanent state of absurdity

Posted by: foff | Nov 1 2013 19:00 utc | 117

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