We're always on the wrong side because of decades of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" as official policy.

Often the enemy of one's enemy is a bigger asshole than the enemy ever dreamed about being.

Maybe the Saudis will declare war on Qatar like they have Yemen.

No...The Turks have a big base and Troops there and we have the airbase for the region there with lots of Troops...so no the new Prince is bold and brash but unless this is the place the eventual war starts...no.

What is the rationale for the Turks to be in Arabia, this long after the 33rd Academy Awards?

Don't you mean the 35th?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPQ7CR3wn8A

Yes, yes I do.

A good friend of mine worked for the Al Jazeera America studio in DC for a few years. He said they ran a remarkably good show on a shoestring, mostly by spending their money on good people instead of hardware. That did cause some problems on the technical side of things, but their on-air presence was quite polished.

After a quick google, I learned that the entire citizenry of Qatar (313k) is less than half the population of Washington DC. The resident population of Qatar is overwhelmingly made up of expats at a ratio of nearly 9:1, expats:citizens.

I knew Qatar was tiny, but not that tiny.

As a term "expat" tends to conjure up an image of wealthy American and European company employees living abroad. For Qatar it's mostly poor foreign laborers employed by Quataris.

True, but expatriot means anyone living outside their nation of citizenship, for whatever reason. We just tend to glamorize it.

I've been following this as well. I'm highly concerned this will devolve into military action, with Qatar as the short term goal, and Iran as the long term goal. Wars are a great distraction from an unpopular presidency and a Congress that is passing equally unpopular laws. The GCC really wants to get rid of Al Jazeera, and the US would love to control the natural gas. When President Trump visited the Suadi's and started agreeing with the kingdom's finger pointing at Qatar as a supporter of terrorists, it sounded a lot like the kind of BS that was spouted before the second Iraq war. There's a lot for the leaders of the GCC and the US to gain from taking out the leadership of Qatar. I'm curious to see what Turkey and Russia are going to say/do concerning this in the coming months.

From the Independent ...

Saudi Arabia has played Donald Trump like a fiddle when it comes to the dispute with Qatar With the prospect of Qatar being thrown out of the Gulf Cooperation Council and driven into the arms of Iran, the horrible reality is that the Middle East crisis may be one of Trump’s own making

Just more proof...

Saudi Arabia has 'clear link' to UK extremism, report says

Prime Minister Theresa May, who visited Saudi Arabia in April, has insisted the UK's historic relationship with the desert kingdom is important for British security and trade.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has called for the immediate suspension of UK arms exports to Saudi Arabia because of its human rights record and involvement in military action in Yemen.