Week 17 Blog

A few days ago the Iranian government claimed that they had shot down a US drone over their airspace. The drone was confirmed to be down but at first and still the US does not know for sure if the drone went down for mechanical reasons inside Iran and is using this to make them look good, or if they actually did take the drone down.

First of all I don't think we would be flying a drone over Iranian airspace because tensions are already high enough. However the question of how the drone went down still confuses me. How would we not see a missile coming on our radar towards our UAV? I personally believe the bird went down over someone else's territory and happened to glide under its own power into Iran. If you look at the pictures the bird is surprisingly intact which one makes it hard to believe it was shot down and two would make me think that the UAV really did just have a mechanical problem and now the Iranians are using it to undermine us once again.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/envoy/iran-releases-images-downed-u-spy-drone-171144210.html

Week 16 Blog

A few days ago info was received by the United States from a group of Chinese undergrad students who had information that was deemed very sensitive. It seems that the Chinese has a network of tunnels that contain several nuclear missles capable of striking US soil. Now the United States and their allies have been placing sanctions on nations armed with Nuclear missles that we deem to be a threat (Iran). There has been tensions between China and The US recently also though.

Would you say that placing sanctions on a country like China would be a realistic idea? If  not how would you suppose the United States should protect themselves from a nuclear armed Communist nation? Remember the Cold War was over the same issues with another Communist nation. I think sanctions would be a bad idea but i dont know how else we could protect ourselves because the chinese have spent lots of money on these systems so they arent just going to give them up willingly.

http://news.yahoo.com/digging-china-nuclear-tunnels-013008319.html

Week 15 Blog

This week the United States along with Great Britain and Canada will unveil new political and economic sanction on the country of Iran. Britain will be cutting off all ties to the banks of Iran and the U.S. and Canada will have a number of political sanctions enforced. All these sanctions come after speculation arose that Iran has completed at least 1 nuclear device. The sanctions wre hoping to put further pressuer on the Iranians to the point that they wiil stop furthering their aims at nuclear weapons.

http://news.yahoo.com/us-britain-canada-team-iran-sanctions-171315971.html

I personally believe that the sanctions are not working. We have put sanctions on Iran before and they still have gotten to this point. I know that the banks will hurt Iran when the money from Great Britain is cut off but will it be enough? I don't think we need to invade Iran but at this point the sanctions dont seem to be working as planned. The previous sanctions were setup in the hopes of not allowing the Iranians to produce a nuclear weapon and now they may have them. If they do indeed have a weapon then the sanctions would have seemed to failed. What do you think should be done about the nuclear program in Iran? Should we keep placing sanctions on the country when it seems to be failing?

Week 13

Over the weekend the Arab league suspended its member Syria because of escalating violence within the country. The league hoped to put pressure on the nation that has now been in turmoil for 8 months. The president al Assad has refused to sit with opposition leaders because he fears loss of power in the nation like in Libya and Egypt. Assad said the league was acting like a puppet for Obama. The leagues suspension was only there for the united states to be happy.

I don't think we had any say in the suspension. The Arab league is a close group of 22 nations that has let western views sway their reasoning very seldom. I believe this will put pressure on the Syrians because they value their place in the league. This may also help being an end to the killings in the country now after nearly 3,500 civilians have been killed by security forces in the country.

Week 12 Blog

In response to one of the "What would you do" segments I chose the one about the people getting cut in line. I thought it was a pretty good test because thats a very real situation. I would probably not be one of those people who let some one cut especially if it was an express line and I had a few  things and so did the other person. There just would not be a point. If i had 3 things and they only had 2 they can wait. I dont think the person who won something owes the person money just because they got to go in front of them. Sometimes we dont get rewarded in the way we think we should when we do something nice. Sometimes the reward is just knowing that we did something nice for another person and it made them happy. I would be upset a little if they won but my faith tells me all good things come in time and if its not my time its just not.

Week 11 Blog

As we all know Syria is one of the many nations in the Middle East that has been revolting against its own government. Assad, the President of Syria, has issued harsh curfew, arrested thousands, killed hundreds, and abused his powers to bend the people to his own will. On Friday, Assad issued the killing of 40 civilians who he had considered to be traders. Assad is ruling the country with a mainly Shi'ite presence. (the type of islam most often associatd with terrorism) The country is full of Sunni muslims. Sunni muslims are generally peacful and are almost 100% of the time pacifists. Now Assad has made a statement that if the West were to try to intervene like in Libya, the resuls would be disasterous for all involved.

I believe that Assad may be a little less harsh than Gadafi but he is still a dictator. Assad needs to be delt with accordingly. He should be found and either tried or killed by the people with Western help. We need to show the people of the Middle East that we support their uprisings. The people are not bad in the Middle East the people in power are. They need our help. What are the people going to say in twenty years when they look back at this moment? Will they say look there is the United States, the country who just stood by while we were oppressed and our people were beaten and slaughtered in the streets? The people need our help. Not just the US but all of the West.