naraburns nihil supernum
11mo ago
(text post)
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #2
This is a refreshed megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
El salvador has managed to lock up 100k men almost overnight. So it can be done.
El Salvador was still (somehow) a democracy dealing with an internal problem of gangsters that honestly seem to have just gotten too big for their britches. They still had enough of a military advantage to handle it, feckless leadership apparently just had to learn to stop trying to pay them off because they were emboldened to keep escalating. Once they took action they actually had some legitimacy with the rest of the populace to enforce their rule.
I'm unsure if Mexico could honestly do the same now, with its more powerful cartels.
Let alone Israel which is not facing gangsters who were slowly transitioning into terrorism encouraged by governments paying the Danegeld but an active and prepared pseudo-sovereign terrorist group (who're opposed to identifying tattoos on principle, unlike LatAm sociopaths) holding sway over an entire region with in-built religious and historical reasons to hate Israelis. Hard to see where the legitimacy will come from here.
I don't think the limiting factor is the strength of Mexico's Military (watch cartel vs Army footage, the cartels get massacred every time, that one time CJNG took down a helicopter has been mythologized). In Mexico's case the real problem is just how bloody corrupt the government is on aggregate. If Mexico had someone unshakeable with a one-track mind like Bukeles, I'm sure they could probably achieve the same outcome.
The first time I became aware someone was corrupt was watching a general in the Mexican army being interviewed by Nightline or Newshour or some show. I was maybe 13 and I recall him telling the interviewer about how he had this many men and they were covering that many kilometers searching for the other cartel smugglers...
"Sir," the reporter interrupted, "How many have you caught?"
Ten seconds of dead silence, and the look on the general's face that made it clear catching people was not part of his plans--and that's the day I realized how the world worked.
I heard the same rant from every American General in command of the Afghanistan invasion and occupation for decades, though usually before a congress tame enough not to ask any awkward questions.
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Notes -
El Salvador was still (somehow) a democracy dealing with an internal problem of gangsters that honestly seem to have just gotten too big for their britches. They still had enough of a military advantage to handle it, feckless leadership apparently just had to learn to stop trying to pay them off because they were emboldened to keep escalating. Once they took action they actually had some legitimacy with the rest of the populace to enforce their rule.
I'm unsure if Mexico could honestly do the same now, with its more powerful cartels.
Let alone Israel which is not facing gangsters who were slowly transitioning into terrorism encouraged by governments paying the Danegeld but an active and prepared pseudo-sovereign terrorist group (who're opposed to identifying tattoos on principle, unlike LatAm sociopaths) holding sway over an entire region with in-built religious and historical reasons to hate Israelis. Hard to see where the legitimacy will come from here.
I don't think the limiting factor is the strength of Mexico's Military (watch cartel vs Army footage, the cartels get massacred every time, that one time CJNG took down a helicopter has been mythologized). In Mexico's case the real problem is just how bloody corrupt the government is on aggregate. If Mexico had someone unshakeable with a one-track mind like Bukeles, I'm sure they could probably achieve the same outcome.
The first time I became aware someone was corrupt was watching a general in the Mexican army being interviewed by Nightline or Newshour or some show. I was maybe 13 and I recall him telling the interviewer about how he had this many men and they were covering that many kilometers searching for the other cartel smugglers...
"Sir," the reporter interrupted, "How many have you caught?"
Ten seconds of dead silence, and the look on the general's face that made it clear catching people was not part of his plans--and that's the day I realized how the world worked.
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