Ah ****. Dutch government collapses over Bosnia

[Imran Siddiqui]

Britain will keep a left wing government.

Who says they are left wing?

[Bereta_Eder]

Shi believes that wiglaf is my DL...



he said I am eccentric enough and have an interest in foreign policy enough to pull this through.


I think wiglaf is a DL of AH.

[Bereta_Eder]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Britain will keep a left wing government.

Who says they are left wing?

Just Blair

[Clear Skies]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus

Britain will keep a left wing government.

Again it has to be said, since when is Blair a left-winger?
Oh sorry, is this in the same twisted world where Norman Tebbit is actually a nice person, Prince Philip never insults ANYONE and Victoria Beckham weighs over the national average?

[Zoid]

The question is: Who is disciplined enough to maintain the Wiggy DL without blowing his cover? I don´t think AH could pull it off, wasn´t he the one who squealed in the Area 25 affair?

I think one of the serious posters has the Wiggy DL to blow off steam, maybe Imran?

[Ecthy]

Germany might be right-wing after the next elections. That is despite AND because more people than ever will vote for communists. It's an irony, but any vote for communists is a non-vote for greens and social democrats, hence a red red vote is a black vote.

[Bereta_Eder]

hmm this will be difficult because we (or at least I) don't know the termonology in english
but
what is the electoral system in your countries?

In Greece it is enhanced analogue. (which HUGELY favors NON coalition governments and the formation of one strong government based on one party)

[Zoid]

Originally posted by Ecthelion
Germany might be right-wing after the next elections. That is despite AND because more people than ever will vote for communists. It's an irony, but any vote for communists is a non-vote for greens and social democrats, hence a red red vote is a black vote.

Yeah, but what can you do? If you don´t want to support Die Grünen or SPD, who in some cases are just as bad as the right-wing, there´s either the commie vote or abstaining.

[Ecthy]

I might still vote for the big social democratic one,s but that would be ideological suicide

[Imran Siddiqui]

I think one of the serious posters has the Wiggy DL to blow off steam, maybe Imran?

I blow off steam through spam!

[C0ckney]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Britain will keep a left wing government.

Who says they are left wing?

Best Conservative government we've had in years

[Ribannah]

Re: Ah ****. Dutch government collapses over Bosnia

Originally posted by paiktis22
THE HAGUE (Reuters) - The Dutch government collapsed on Tuesday after Prime Minister Wim Kok's cabinet resigned en-masse over a report condemning the Netherlands' failure to prevent the worst massacre of the Bosnian war.

Please note that the task of the troops was to keep peace, and this as part and under command of the international force.

The primary criticism is that the Dutch politicians should not have accepted this specific task in the first place. Srebrenica was basically under siege from the get-go, there was no peace to keep and the idea that a small group of lightly armed peacekeepers could prevent a full Serb division and then some from doing anything they wanted is ludicrous.

In the event the Serbs took the town without a shot being fired.

Not true. The Dutch troops maintained their outpost for as long as they could under a heavy barrage by tanks and artillery, waiting for the air support that was promised to them. Additionally, there were Moslim troops in the area who did quite a bit of fighting but in the end were savagely wiped out.

The report leaves two questions unanswered IMHO:

[1] How is it that the Serbs knew they could safely attack the enclave that time? They had been in the hills for quite a while without trying.

[2] How come the American fighter planes, that had patrolled the area often enough, reported that they "could not find the target" after (due to political pressure?) the command to respond finally came?

I would not be surprised if the enclave was "given" to the Serbs to ease rallying against them in response.

[Goingonit]

Sh*t! Sh*t! I am representing these people in a model UN tomorrow! Better have a government by then, let me tell you...

[David Floyd]

AFAIK, the problem was that the Dutch soldiers were not combat troops and had terrible rules of engagement (from the viewpoint of someone who thinks they shoulda been there at all, anyway - I think their RoEs were just peachy ), not that they wittingly allowed a massacre.

[Felch]

Are Dutch soldiers ever combat troops? It doesn't seem like they would really need them. Or are they going to fight off "ze Germans?"